KEY TAKEAWAYS: The Besthoff family donated Isamu Noguchi’s 40-ton Mississippi Fountain to NOMA. The 18-foot-tall sculpture has stood at KB Plaza since the early 1960s. NOMA plans to install the sculpture in front of the museum this fall. The gift honors Sydney Besthoff III, whose collection helped establish the Besthoff Sculpture Garden.   The New Orleans Museum of Art will add a monumental sculpture by renowned artist Isamu Noguchi to its collection following a gift from the Besthoff family, with plans to relocate the 40-ton work from KB Plaza to the museum this fall. The sculpture, Mississippi Fountain, also known as The Mississippi, stands 18 feet tall and has been installed at KB Plaza since the early 1960s. NOMA said preparations are underway to place the work in front of the museum, with Lee Ledbetter and Associates designing the installation plan. The Besthoff family donated the sculpture in honor of the late Sydney Besthoff III, whose collection of large-scale sculpture helped form the foundation of NOMA’s Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden. Isamu Noguchi’s Mississippi Fountain, 1961–62, in New Orleans’s KB Plaza. Created in 1961-62, Mississippi Fountain was designed for the plaza of what was then the John Hancock Insurance Co. headquarters. The building, now commonly known as KB Plaza, was designed by architect Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore, Owings Merrill with local architects Nolan, Norman and Nolan. The sculpture reflects Noguchi’s interpretation of the Mississippi River and his interest in the relationship between landscape, water and movement, according to the museum. “Isamu Noguchi’s Mississippi Fountain was designed in conversation with the architecture of Bunshaft’s plaza and building. Now, visitors will find new meaning as it transforms the neoclassical façade of the museum,” Susan M. Taylor, the Montine McDaniel Freeman director of NOMA, said in a statement. “We are grateful to the Besthoff family for this incredible gift, which ensures that the work remains in New Orleans and publicly accessible for generations to come.” Noguchi, who lived from 1904 to 1988, was one of the 20th century’s prominent sculptors and designers. Mississippi Fountain is an example of his decades-long collaboration with Bunshaft, whose architectural projects included Lever House and One Chase Manhattan Plaza in New York and the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University. Sydney Besthoff III purchased the New Orleans building in 1974 to serve as headquarters for KB, the Gulf South pharmacy chain founded in 1905 by his grandfather, Sydney J. Besthoff, and Gustave Katz. According to NOMA, Besthoff credited Mississippi Fountain with helping inspire his collection of large-scale sculptures. That collection eventually became the basis for the Besthoff Sculpture Garden. Besthoff and his wife, Walda, played central roles in developing and expanding the sculpture garden, which opened in 2003 and grew to 12 acres in 2019. The garden now includes nearly 100 sculptures and outdoor works spanning the 19th through 21st centuries. “Our father loved NOMA and believed deeply in the importance of bringing great art to New Orleans. We are honored to donate this Isamu Noguchi sculpture in his memory and to know that it will be experienced by visitors for many years. We hope it serves as a lasting reminder of his commitment to the museum and to the city he loved,” Jane Steiner, a NOMA trustee, and Valerie Besthoff said on behalf of the family. The donation will keep Mississippi Fountain in New Orleans while moving it from the commercial property where it has stood for more than six decades to a prominent public location at the museum. NOMA, located in New Orleans City Park, maintains a collection of nearly 50,000 works in addition to operating the Besthoff Sculpture Garden, which is free and open to the public seven days a week. ...read more read less