Archeologist, Sculptor Win 'Genius' Grants

Others receiving the awards include a young San Francisco woman running a program to guide troubled girls out of delinquency and poverty, and an Oakland environmentalist seeking better ways to share limited water supplies.

The awards, designed to allow creative individuals to explore their muses more freely, consist of a $500,000 grant, paid over five years, that can be used by the recipient any way he or she pleases.

"I was completely stunned when I heard about the award, and I still am," said sculptor Ned Kahn, whose works incorporate wind, water, fire, light and fog. One of the struggles of making a living as a sculptor "is that you have to say yes to everything that comes along. With support for a while, I can pick and choose and hopefully do some interesting things I might not have done otherwise."

Kahn learned his craft making exhibits at the San Francisco Exploratorium, but has since broadened his horizons. One of his works, installed on the Ventura Pier in 1993 and lost to storm damage three years later, used the energy of ocean waves to blow waterspouts out of a spiral structure.

Most recently, Kahn helped design a children's garden now under construction at the Huntington Botanical Gardens in Pasadena. The garden features a dozen of his sculptures -- such as a musical instrument that is played by dropping pebbles through a complex of stainless-steel rods -- integrated into the landscape.

Like Kahn's work, all of the recipients' efforts are "distinctively bold and original," said Daniel J. Socolow, director of the MacArthur Fellows Program. The recipients are all, he added, "highly focused, tenacious and creative."

Those are words often used to describe Tom Joyce, 46, who has taken working with metals out of the smithy and into the art gallery. Joyce quit high school at 16 to become a blacksmith, putting old materials together in new ways to make not only door hardware, light fixtures and furniture, but also sprawling outdoor installations, such as a gate forged from scrap metal collected by local residents from the banks of the Rio Grande.