More female winners? San Diego-bound Kyoto Prize laureates include MIT visual artist Joan Jonas

The Kyoto Prize, whose recipients annually travel to San Diego for public presentations, had a reputation as a scholarly old boys’ club.

But the recipients of the 34th annual prize, announced today in Japan, include visual artist Joan Jonas, the fourth woman in the last seven years. While male laureates still outnumber their female peers, it took 25 years for the Inamori Foundation — the nonprofit that oversees the awards — to select the first four female recipients.

Jonas, 81, a professor emerita at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was cited for creating “a new artistic form by integrating performance art and video art.”

“Joan is a giant and she deserves all recognition for a lifetime of superlative achievements,” said Hashim Sarkis, dean of MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning. “Yet the Kyoto Prize cannot overshadow the work that is to come — the continuously bold, experimental work, the eternally youthful outlook, and her perpetually poetic insights into our world’s problems.

“Her best work will always be her next work.”

The other 2018 laureates are Karl Deisseroth, 41, a neuroscientist and Stanford University professor; and Masaki Kashiwara, 71, a mathematician and project professor at Kyoto University. Kashiwara is a leader in algebraic analysis, while Desseroth has advanced the new discipline of optogenetics, which uses light to control neurons in living tissue.

The prizes, which comes with a 20-karat gold medal and 100 million yen or about $915,000, will be awarded during ceremonies in Kyoto on Nov. 10. Next March, the laureates will travel to San Diego to give lectures and demonstrations.

The prize is the brainchild of Kazuo Inamori, founder of Kyocera, a manufacturer of industrial ceramics with North American headquarters in San Diego. Underwritten by his Inamori Foundation, the Kyoto Prize recognizes achievements in three broad areas: advanced technology, basic sciences and arts and philosophy.

Among the previous recipients are primatologist Jane Goodall (1990), film director Akira Kurosawa (1994) and linguist Noam Chomsky (1988).

Every spring since 2001, the current laureates have appeared in San Diego for free speeches and performances.