Light and Stone: Revisiting Noguchi's 1986 Venice Biennale

The Noguchi Museum, 9-01 33rd Rd, 11106, New York City

6 maggio 2026 – 9 maggio 2027

Marking the fortieth anniversary of Isamu Noguchi's U.S. Pavilion in the 1986 Venice Biennale, Light and Stone examines one of the artist's most provocative exhibitions through materials from The Noguchi Museum's collection and archive. In 1986, Noguchi became the first solo artist to represent the United States at the Venice Biennale with What Is Sculpture?, selected by Commissioner Alanna Heiss and curated by Henry Geldzahler. At its center was Slide Mantra, a ten-foot marble spiral slide embodying Noguchi's commitment to play as essential human experience, displayed alongside cast-bronze models of unrealized public playground proposals. Additional works included large-scale stone and steel pieces and prominently featured Akari light sculptures. Amid prevailing anti-craft and anti-design sentiments, Noguchi forged dialectics between monumentality and lightness, tradition and technology, abstraction and functionality. The exhibition revisits this visionary practice through archival photographs, architectural sketches, a model for Slide Mantra, and Akari sculptures.