It is a planet more than a museum. We landed there after a trip to a strange area of Queens, opposite Manhattan. Astoria, its warehouses, its factories, its buildings without charm… It is this rather deprived corner of New York that Isamu Noguchi chose to found his museum, a stone’s throw from the East River, in 1985, three years before his dead. He knew the place well.
The American-Japanese, to whom the LaM, in Villeneuve-d’Ascq, is devoting a fascinating exhibition, lived and worked opposite. From his studio came his creations: abstract stone sculptures, monumental objects, furniture… Or his famous Akari paper lamps, still mass-produced. A work spread over several decades, mixing art and design as rarely, without anyone really knowing in which category to place it. And the visit to the Queens museum does not offer an answer, any more than that of the LaM, so unique and stimulating is Isamu Noguchi’s work.
In 1985, therefore, Noguchi set up everyone in a former photoengraving factory and a service station near his studio. We are here close to Manhattan geographically, but very far in spirit. In any case, very far from the world of New York art, from the openings of the elegant Upper East Side or the very lively Downtown. A logical choice for the artist, who had devoted his life to “open the way to a sculpture that is humanly significant without being realistic, both abstract and relevant to society”.
This museum is a form of donation from him to Queens. “The neighborhood is an integral part of this story, a quiet corner that is little visited by the inhabitants of the rest of the city: it is very characteristic of Noguchi’s personality and his desire to found a place far from the beaten track”, describes photographer Daniel Shea, who also practices sculpture. For M, the New Yorker passionate about urban planning has surveyed these enchanting spaces, returning to the neighborhood where he spent ten years of his life. “Noguchi was a big inspiration to me. Here was the godfather! »
His images reveal the luminous world that hides behind the red brick facade. When the sculptor and designer embarked on this latest adventure, he was at the height of his career. The Whitney Museum dedicated it in 1968, then the MoMA in 1977. Its lights, moons made of washi (Japanese paper), are a worldwide success. It was then that he began, with the architect Shoji Sadao, the construction of his own temple. The inauguration took place in 1985, just before he represented the United States at the 42e Venice Biennale. He spent his last decade refining every detail. He carefully selects each sculpture, as “moments of revelation, breakthroughs over [sa] personal research, he described.
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