Made of lightweight aluminum, Miss Expanding Universe resulted from the intellectual and romantic partnership between modernist sculptor Isamu Noguchi and Chicago dancer and choreographer Ruth Page. In 1932 Page per- formed an avant-garde dance, Expanding Universe, wearing a futuristic jersey sack designed by Noguchi; only her head and feet emerged from its stretchy, cocooning shape, a constraint evoked by the sculpture’s abstract form.

Noguchi here combined machine-age streamlining with the austere characteristics of ancient Japanese funerary objects (haniwa). Born in the United States, he lived in Japan until he was thirteen years old, and later extensively studied the country’s sculptural traditions and ceramics.