Going dotty over Yayoi Kusama

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From Here to Infinity. Image courtesy of the Zoumboulakis Gallery

Many consider that her colour-popping, dizzying creations influenced Andy Warhol.  Without doubt, the avant garde Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama was a forebearer of the Pop Art movement. The still-spritely 89-year-old with the signature flaming wig has exhibited hallucinatory works such as “Infinity Nets” and her “Dots Obsessions” series (Kusama fetishized dots long before Damien Hirst populated the planet with his own versions) and has staged provocative art events in New York and elsewhere across the world (at the 1966 Venice Biennale she hawked mirrored balls from her “Narcissus Garden” installation to passersby).

Now, Athens appreciators have the chance to immerse themselves in the magically eccentric world of Yayoi Kusama at a new installation staged by the Zoumboulakis Gallery to coincide with the publication of the Museum of Modern Art’s recent publication: “Yayoi Kusama: From Here to Infinity”.

The book, written by Sara Suzuki (MoMA Curator) and illustrated by Ellen Weinstein, is a biographical title that depicts Yayoi Kusama’s vivid body of work, her turbulent life, her obsessions, her illusions, her schizophrenic tendencies, her visions and, above all, the genius manifested by her tremendous talent.

Zoumboulakis has selected 7 of Kusama’s imaginative works to comprise their tribute.

From Here to Infinity published by MoMA

I wanted to predict and measure the infinity of the unlimited universe with dots | dots.

How deep is the mystery?

Is there unlimited infinity beyond our own universe?

By exploring these questions, I wanted to delve into this unique dot that is my own life.

One dot. A unique particle between billions.

(Extract from the autobiography of Yayoi Kusama)