Kite House Magoji

From August 2–6, 2023, T​​he Noguchi Museum Shop presented a special installation of the work of Kite House Magoji, a third-generation kite maker in Tobata, Kitakyushu, Japan.

Kite flying has a strong history in the windy coastal Tobata area of Kitakyushu City. Kite maker Magoji Takeuchi founded the House in the Meiji era, and today his grandson Yoshihiro Takeuchi and great granddaughter Azusa Tatsuishi carry on the family’s tradition. The form of the cicada is the original and signature design of the family’s work, which has since expanded to include other creatures and folklore figures.

Each kite is constructed and painted by hand. The materials used are chosen to be safe for children (food coloring paint) and also sustainable (locally made washi paper and locally sourced bamboo), should they fly away and be reclaimed by nature.

For more information, contact shop@noguchi.org.

Today a kite flying in the sky, or even just the idea of it, brings us closer to the elements. And sculpture, in that it relates us to our place in the universe, becomes more like this old, new childish thing.

^{Isamu Noguchi, “Preface to a Book on Tsutomu Hiroi,” Tsutomu Hiroi (Tokyo: Tsutomu Hiroi, 1972)}