A two-volume archival excavation of Noguchi’s enduring relationship with Greece
Noguchi and Greece, Greece and Noguchi explores the relationship between one of the 20th century’s most celebrated art and design multidisciplinarians and the Mediterranean country he visited regularly for decades. Through an engaging visual essay of letters, photographs, sketches and words from the artist himself, new light is shed on the intimate relationship Noguchi had with Greece’s creative community, history, myths and material culture. With this engagingly designed two-volume box set, readers will discover Noguchi’s long-held fascination with Greece and how his legacy lives on in the country. Noguchi and Greece, Greece and Noguchi explores the enduring influence of Greek art, design and evolving cultural identity on Noguchi’s internationalist perspective. New essays delve into Noguchi’s fertile collaborations with dancers and choreographers inspired by Greece, including innovative American choreographer Martha Graham, and the gradual development of Noguchi’s truly interdisciplinary practice. A portrait of Noguchi, already a consummate traveler before he first embarked on his explorations of Greece, is provided by a meditation on his transformative relationship with maverick architect Buckminster Fuller, who saw Noguchi for the person-of-the-world that he was. This collaborative publication includes Noguchi’s Greece-centered works across sculpture, design and architecture, alongside a series of responsive texts and artworks by contemporary design studio Objects of Common Interest, led by Eleni Petaloti and Leonidas Trampoukis, and a series of photographs by current practitioners inspired by Noguchi’s interdisciplinary legacy. Noguchi and Greece, Greece and Noguchi is an extension of a research and exhibition project initiated by OoCI with the Noguchi Museum in New York.
