The Museum of Modern Art collects and prizes the sculpture and designs of Isamu Noguchi, a towering figure in 20th-century American art. But just across West 53rd Street, the developer of 666 Fifth Avenue, Brookfield Properties, is planning the opposite: dismantling one of Noguchi’s largest sculptural installations, one that he called “a landscape of clouds” that he designed in 1957 in the skyscraper’s twin lobbies. — The New York Times
Writing in The New York Times, Joseph Giovannini looks into the uncertain fate facing a "landscape of clouds" designed by noted sculptor Isamu Noguchi for the lobby of a 41-story skyscraper that is undergoing a renovation from Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates. Preservation groups, including Docomomo and the Isamu Noguchi Museum, have voiced concern over the proposed lobby renovations and are fighting to have the installation preserved in-situ.
3 Comments
A photo if you were wondering.
Theres another great Noguchi-designed "lunar landscape" ceiling at a U-Haul facility in St. Louis:
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/04/arts/design/noguchi-ceiling-from-1940s-is-uncovered-at-u-haul-in-st-louis.html
This one, I believe, is still intact. It was hidden for years (I remember architecture professors waxing on about this ceiling during lectures), and was uncovered back in 2016.
this ugly building has an interesting provenance - it's owned by Kushner Properties, and was the first big NYC commercial deal led by Trump's son-in-law. He hired Zaha Hadid to design a replacement for the tower. But the whole thing was a money-losing debacle, and it ended up being leased to Brookfield, who now needs to figure out how to make it more attractive to high-rent tenants.
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