Abstract Composition

Isamu Noguchis Abstract Composition from 1930 is a stencil print with watercolor over graphite on brown wove paper that represents the artists exploration of geometric abstraction during his Guggenheim Fellowship year, a period when he was absorbing the lessons of Brancusis abstraction while developing his own sculptural vocabulary. The stencil technique, in which shapes are cut from a material and paint is applied through the openings to create sharp-edged forms, produces the kind of clean, geometric shapes that Noguchi was experimenting with in his sculpture, translating the continuous curves of Brancusis ovoid forms into the flat, sharp-edged abstractions that characterize the international style of the late 1920s and early 1930s. The combination of opaque and translucent watercolor creates a layered effect in which some shapes appear to float above the brown paper ground while others merge with it, producing a spatial ambiguity that parallels the sculptural challenge of creating forms that exist in real space rather than on a flat surface. The traces of graphite visible beneath the watercolor reveal the preparatory drawing that preceded the stenciling, a working process in which geometric forms were first sketched and then refined through the subtractive process of stencil cutting. The brown wove paper provides a warm ground that unifies the composition and gives the geometric shapes a material warmth that pure white paper would not provide, a choice that reflects Noguchis preference for natural materials and earth tones that would characterize his sculptural and design work throughout his career.

Noguchis abstract works of 1930 are important documents of the formative period when he was synthesizing Brancusis abstraction with his own developing aesthetic, and their influence on the development of sculptural abstraction and design extends to the mid-century modern movement. The stencil technique he employed connects his work to the Bauhaus and De Stijl traditions of geometric abstraction.

A stencil print with watercolor by Noguchi from his 1930 Guggenheim year, combining opaque and translucent layers over graphite on brown paper to create geometric abstractions that translate Brancusian sculptural forms into the flat, sharp-edged vocabulary of international style abstraction.