2006 Volume 69 Issue 5 Pages 373-378
Isamu NOGUCHI (1904-1988) is a Japanese-American sculptor who worked not only on an individual sculpture but on a space as a sculpture calling it a 'garden'. He developed the idea of a spatial sculpture by observing traditional Japanese gardens and adapted the thoughts and elements of Japanese gardens into his spatial design. Noguchi also sought the way to unite the spiritual side of Japanese gardens and the function of Western plazas. The purpose of this study is to clarify Noguchis attempts mentioned above through examining the process and design of gardens of Banrai-sha and Readers Digest Tokyo Branch by researching 360 related articles and documents since 1950, mainly written in Japanese. Those two gardens were Noguchis earliest garden works, carried out in 1950-51 in Japan. In Banrai-sha garden, Noguchi drew an abstract form on the ground using a method of Japanese garden called 'jimoyo'. In Readers Digest Tokyo Branch garden, Noguchi experienced to work with Japanese gardeners and learnt the skill of Japanese gardens such as the way of arranging natural stones.
