Having never formally trained in design, I had no idea who Isamu Nogouchi was when I first started creating gardens and working with stone….actually, now that I think of it, I really had no idea of who any designers were! Not until one day when a client asked me if Nogouchi has been an influence was I was first truly exposed to him and his work. Now for me, visiting the Noguchi’s museum located in Queens is like entering a cathedral.
His work spans the use of several mediums from metals, wood, water and earth, but it is not surprising that I am most attracted to his work with stone. Although deliberately worked with by hand, most of his pieces still maintain the true nature and essence of stone. So often, stone is so severely carved and manipulated that the end result could easily be of any material. It loses the integrity of being an object crafted of stone…of being stone itself.
I think my attraction may even border on a sense of kinsmanship (although I am in no way comparing myself to his talent, experience or sense of expression). – he worked on several scales, from small sculptures to large mixed media commissions, from single pieces to quantitative production and has been aptly described as an “internationalist”, having traveled extensively and even maintaining two studios both in the US and one in Japan.
