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Akari 7AD
Akari 7AD
Akari 7AD
Akari 7AD
Akari 7AD
Akari 7AD
Akari 7AD
Akari 7AD
Akari 7AD
Akari 7AD

Akari 7AD

Designed c. 1954
The Akari 7AD is among the first Akari light sculptures designed by Isamu Noguchi. Its soft cuboid form features a black, screenprinted line and rounded rectangle design, mulberry bark washi paper, tight, evenly-spaced bamboo ribbing, and wooden collars (wa). The top of its three-legged metal frame is accented with wrapped bamboo.
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7A
25
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7AD
25
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From the Archives
In 1952, Noguchi continued working on the Akari light sculpture series he had begun a year earlier in Gifu. He created around eighteen models—some with screenprinted designs, like the 7, which featured horizontal stripes—and exhibited them at the Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura.1 An early catalogue (c. 1952) notes that the four models numbered 6–9 have “interchangeable shades...with or without colored designs.”2

Summarizing reception to the show, Hugo Munsterberg wrote in 1953’s College Art Journal, “Critics differed widely as regards the success of these sculptures, but all of them were unanimous in hailing his lamps, which combine modern design with the traditional Japanese lanterns, as eminently successful.”

Noguchi brought the 7, along with a handful of other early models, back to his earthen-walled studio in Kita Kamakura3, situated on the land of famed ceramicist Rosanjin. It was photographed there with an early 12A.

The 7 appears again at the Chuo Koron Gallery exhibition of 1954,4–6 with the patterns from c.1952 (striped and checkered) replaced by a rounded rectangular form on two faces of the shade, and a pair of irregular lines on the alternating remaining faces. Both a black (now called the 7AD) and yellow-brown version are shown.
Installation view, “Isamu Noguchi Exhibition,” Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura, September 23–October 19, 1952. Photo: Isamu Noguchi. The Noguchi Museum Archives, 05500. ©INFGM / ARS
Fig. 1
Akari Lamps by Isamu Noguchi promotional sheet, c. 1952. The Noguchi Museum Archives, LBD_50S_025_005. ©INFGM / ARS
Fig. 2
Interior of Isamu Noguchi's Kita Kamakura studio, with Akari 12A and 7A, c. 1950s. The Noguchi Museum Archives, 03240. ©INFGM / ARS
Fig. 3
Installation view, “Isamu Noguchi Exhibition,” Chuo Koron Gallery, Tokyo, August 2–7, 1954. The Noguchi Museum Archives, 07129. ©INFGM / ARS
Fig. 4
Installation view, “Isamu Noguchi Exhibition,” Chuo Koron Gallery, Tokyo, August 2–7, 1954. The Noguchi Museum Archives, 05510. ©INFGM / ARS
Fig. 5
Isamu Noguchi photographing “Isamu Noguchi Exhibition,” Chuo Koron Gallery, Tokyo, August 2–7, 1954. The Noguchi Museum Archives, 03607. ©INFGM / ARS
Fig. 6
About Akari Light Sculptures

Learn more about the history of Akari, one of Isamu Noguchi’s most successful efforts “to bring sculpture into a more direct involvement with the common experience of living.”

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