Euripides
On View   Original Collection

Euripides

1966
Italian marble
Erminio Cidonio, the owner of Henraux, a very large stone-working and quarrying company in Querceta, Italy, had asked me to design a small enclosure at Henraux for the display of sculptures by the artists who worked there. Euripides was made at that time. The stones I selected, their surfaces rough and worked with time, had been quarried by Altissimo. I wished to make a composition in two parts. There was to be mass, but weight should be avoided. To achieve this, both pieces were hollowed, one vertically, the other horizontally. I then had to face the difficulty I seem to require with carving: how to understand the stone and discover its being. For me, surmounting this difficulty became a part of the carving and component. To thus eat the stone and know its flavor. Euripides must have been the first of my larger efforts in this direction.
Original Noguchi Collection
Quotations by Isamu Noguchi from The Isamu Noguchi Garden Museum (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1987), unless otherwise noted.