Courtesy the Noguchi Museum

The midcentury artist?s failed attempt to create a universal tabletop accessory tells a deep story about how he perceived the power of sculpture In the 1950s, smoking was still considered glamorous, and ashtrays were mainstays inside American homes and universal accessories on tabletops. In some ways, ashtrays are also a perfect design object?aside from the unhealthy habits associated with them, of course?as they?re small-scale manifestos of the people who created them. And for midcentury sculptor and designer Isamu Noguchi, an ashtray was a possible big break.
?He wanted to get rich by making ?this silly little trinket,? as he called it,? says Dakin Hart, curator of The Sculptor and the Ashtray, a new exhibition at the Noguchi Museum, in New York City, on view through August 23.
Courtesy the Noguchi Museum
A never-published magazine article from the 1940s details how Noguchi translated his ideas about sculpture into domestic objects.

Before Noguchi found success with his paper Akari lanterns, before his coffee table became an icon of midcentury design, and before his monumental parks and playscapes became beloved public spaces, he was a struggling artist trying to make ends meet while doggedly pursuing his true life?s work: redefining what sculpture is and exploring how it can mediate the relationships people have with the world around them. To Noguchi, all environments could be considered sculpture.
Noguchi ...