CNN International will be broadcasting an inside look at the Yayoi Kusama Show as part of its New Year’s Eve live special airing December 31st.
The aging population and pandemic have done little to deter Japan’s Yayoi Kusama. The 93-year-old world’s best-selling living female artist paints daily at the psychiatric hospital in which she’s voluntarily checked in and has lived since the 1970s.
Some of her latest work is featured alongside her early drawings in a new exhibition at Hong Kong’s M+ Museum. With more than 200 of her works, Yayoi Kusama: 1945 to Now spans 70 years and is the largest retrospective of her art outside of her native Asia.
Best known for her signature pumpkin carvings and polka-dot paintings worth millions at auction, Kusama’s success has skyrocketed over the past decade. The most photogenic pieces of her oeuvre—including the immersive ‘Infinity Mirror Room’ installations and sold-out pieces in museums around the world—gained mainstream appeal in her social media age. did.
Needless to say, her new Hong Kong exhibition is filled with Instagram-friendly moments. But the museum’s deputy curator Doryun Chung, who co-curated the exhibition, said he hopes visitors will use the opportunity to dig deeper.
“Kusama is more than pumpkin carvings and polka dots,” he explained. “She is a deep philosophical thinker. It reveals a lot about struggle as a source of inspiration.”
The artist’s self-portrait is on display. credit: Noemi Kasanelli/CNN
to infinity and beyond
Arranged chronologically and thematically, the show explores concepts Kusama has revisited across multiple mediums over the course of her career. For example, the concept of infinity appears in the form of recurring motifs inspired by vivid hallucinations she experienced during her childhood. Then she saw everything around her consumed in endless patterns.
Visitors can feel how these shapes have evolved. The first begins with a room filled with her paintings of “Infinity Net”. This includes the groundbreaking work she created after seeing the Pacific Ocean for the first time from her plane window when she moved to Tokyo. In 1957 she left Japan for America.
1/11
“Self-Obliteration” is part of the M+ collection. Scroll through to see other works featured in the new retrospective Yayoi Kusama 1945 to Now. credit: Noemi Kasanelli/CNN
In a selection from My Eternal Soul, a series of hundreds of acrylic paintings she began painting in 2009 and completed last year, the motif gives a bold, vibrant effect to an amoeba-like image. It fills the body of the form. They appear in the colorful “Force of Life” section of her retrospective, immediately following the section titled “Death.” This contrast speaks to both the dichotomy of Kusama’s work and the inner struggle that underpins it.
“We are so used to[people]talking about mental health challenges today, but she started doing this 60 or 70 years ago.” It really goes on, but it never stays in a dark place. I’m here.
Elsewhere, it showcases lesser-known works from the artist’s repertoire, shedding light on what she created midway through her career when she returned to Japan depressed and disillusioned. , there is a 1976 black and white plush cloth sculpture called “Nervous Death”.
Although it is not well known, the exhibition’s curator considers “Nervous Death” to be an important work. It was created in 1976, the year before she was voluntarily admitted to a mental hospital. credit: Noemi Kasanelli/CNN
A 2022 version of the artwork created for M+ and slightly renamed “Death of Nerves” is also on display. In contrast, it embodies resilience and even optimism. An accompanying poem admits that her nerves were left “dead and shredded” after the suicide attempt. she wrote. Her rejuvenated nerves “jump into beautiful, vibrant colors, stretching to the ends of eternity.”
“Nervous Death” can be viewed from multiple floors of the museum. credit: Noemi Kasanelli/CNN
“It’s a rare piece for Kusama, because most people associate her with pumpkins or mirror rooms or more pop shapes, but this is a very soft sculpture that she’s always been working on since the beginning,” says Yoshitake. Mika explained. She is an independent curator and worked with Chong on her M+ show, as well as participating in previous Kusama shows at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington DC and the New York Botanical Garden.
Yoshitake, who said he last saw Kusama in 2018, before the pandemic, added, “I think it’s great that we can keep her strong through art.” “She decided to let her tell her story.”
Smaller in comparison is a group of 11 paintings called “Every Day I Pray for Love” that the artist started in 2021 and completed this summer.
“She has always said, ‘Love is forever.’ She wants people to be at peace, to have this warmth, to care for each other. There are many conflicts, wars, terrorism, There are many things she sees, especially through this pandemic.”
An image of Kusama wearing a representative red wig, which was published in the exhibition materials. credit: Noemi Kasanelli/CNN
In a short email interview with CNN, Kusama explained his dedication to art.
“I paint every day,” she said. She “continues to create a world of awe for life, embracing love, peace and all the messages of the universe.”
Since her teens, Kusama has read Chinese poetry and literature “with a deep respect”.
According to M+, the exhibition has been described by curator and critic Akira Tatehata, who is now director of the Yayoi Kusama Museum in Tokyo, as “the most comprehensive retrospective of the artist’s work to date.” increase. Tachihata, who visited the museum in November, has supported the artist for many years and served as commissioner for her solo exhibition in Japan at the Venice Biennale in 1993.
The healing power of art
This retrospective also has special significance for M+, which used the show as its first anniversary celebration.
Since its conception more than a decade ago, the museum has been touted as Asia’s answer to London’s Tate Modern and New York’s Museum of Modern Art. When it finally opened last year, it closed the museum for three months and until recently banned most international visitors due to Hong Kong’s changing political environment, which continues to raise censorship concerns across sectors, including the arts, due to pandemic restrictions. faced unique challenges. from the city. But Chong sees at least the latter as a “blessing in disguise.”
“Having a global museum open and first and foremost being embraced by a local audience in the first year could not have been a better way to start a museum.
A polka dot pumpkin at the entrance of the museum. credit: Noemi Kasanelli/CNN
“[Kusama]proves that art can indeed be therapeutic and has powerful healing powers,” Chong said. It’s a very important lesson.”