Each year, the Isamu Noguchi Award honors and recognizes the work of individuals who "embody global consciousness, design innovation, and emphasis on cultural exchanges between Eastern and Western cultures." This year's 2021 award will be presented to artist Shio Kusaka and architect Toshiko Mori. 

Both women, born in Japan and practicing in the United States, have had illustrious careers where their work and contribution to art, design, and architecture positions them as leaders in their respective fields.  

Artist Shio Kusaka

Born in Morioka, Japan, Kusaka received her BFA from the University of Washington, Seattle, and lives and works in Los Angeles. Her work focuses on innovative and gracefully playful approaches to the ceramic medium. "Kusaka merges sculpture and drawing, representation and minimalism. Her work synthesizes from a broad range of visual culture, from ancient Japanese pottery to Sol LeWitt's wall drawings, asserting the role of ceramics within the realm of contemporary art," explains the Isamu Noguchi Foundation. 

Architect Toshiko Mori

Renowned architect and academic Toshiko Mori has been a constant force within the architecture industry. As the founding principal of New York-based Toshiko Mori Architect, former Harvard GSD department chair (2002–2008), and the GSD's first tenured female professor, Mori's contributions to the discipline is shown through a diverse body of work. "Her integration of the surrounding environment in her designs, her thoughtful sensitivity in selecting materials, and her advocacy and activism for sustainability in architecture reflect values that she shares with Noguchi, with whom she interned while an architecture student at Cooper Union," shares the Foundation.

The presentation of the award will take place during the annual benefit at the Isamu Noguchi Foundation's Garden Museum on October 5, 2021. For more information about the annual benefit and award click here. 

Past editions of the award have gone to Ghanaian-British architect Sir David Adjaye and noted Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang (2020), Japanese Industrial Designer Naoto Fukasawa and American landscape designer Edwina von Gal (2018), and Japanese architect Tadao Ando and American sculptor Elyn Zimmerman (2016), to name a few.