Isamu Noguchi / Qi Baishi / Beijing 1930

Organized by UMMA in partnership with the Noguchi Museum in New York, this nationally touring exhibition project will feature approximately sixty drawings, including ink paintings, calligraphic works, and sculptures and interpretive materials from UMMA, the Noguchi Museum, and other public and private collections that will shed new light on the transformative relationship between American sculptor Isamu Noguchi (1904-1988) and Chinese ink painter Qi Baishi (1864-1957).

In 1930 at the age of twenty-six, Isamu Noguchi traveled eastward on the Trans-Siberian Railroad towards Japan, where he hoped for reconciliation with his father and a reconnection with the childhood sources of his artistic inspiration. Noguchi stopped en route for six months in Beijing, where he met and studied with the renowned Chinese brush-and-ink painter Qi Baishi, an experience that greatly affected his creative vision. This exhibition will showcase the artists’ cross-cultural creative impulses and underscore their respective and lasting influences on contemporary practice. The exhibition will be accompanied by a scholarly publication and will be on view in Long Island City and Seattle following its debut in Ann Arbor.