It’s time again to remind you regularly that you’ll never be as productive as Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama has been in recent years – since she was in her late 80s. It doesn’t matter that she has been a force in the art world for decades; The 89-year-old artist has proven to be astonishingly successful in her mission to take over her, initiating the year-long world tour of her 65-year retrospective, which has already broken visitor records and now has strict rules that allow visitors only 30 seconds per Selfie; secretly build their own museum; reasserting her reign as Instagram’s favorite artist with a new installation on the beach in Queens, New York, for which she transported 1,500 reflective stainless steel spheres to the Rockaways.
This latest version of Narcissus Garden, sanctioned by MoMA PS1, the Rockaway Artists Alliance, Jamaica Bay-Rockaway Parks Conservancy, National Park Service, and Bloomberg Philanthropies, is a far cry from the original version of the installation that Kusama released decades ago staged for the first time. without permission – at the 1966 Venice Biennale. Before it closed, she stood next to a sign that read “Your Narcissism for Sale” amid her spread reflective silver balls, tossed them in the air, and sold them for only $ 2 each Piece – a step with which she later demonstratively compared “selling hot dogs or ice cream cones.”
Yayoi Kusama with “Narcissus Garden”, which was installed in 1966 at the Venice Biennale.
Courtesy of MoMA
At this point, each sphere was made of plastic, although in the decades since – in which Kusama has been staging nude happenings and capitalist reviews – it has become stainless steel, which makes it all the more amazing that they usually appear to be floating. in ponds around the world including Central Park, Connecticut, and Brazil; and in an outdoor art oasis in southern France. This time, however, she has moved them from the water to the land. In the concrete shell of the former railroad garage, which dates back to the beach’s days as an army base at Fort Tilden, the bullets have the same eerie effect as if they were mysteriously floating, reflecting the abandonment and damage caused by Hurricane Sandy the interiors of the building are weathered.
Yayoi Kusamas Narcissus Garden, 1966–2011, below the house.
Photographs by Matthieu Salvaing; Photo assistant: Hugo Terragrossa
As has become customary for Rockaway !, MoMA PS1’s annual free public arts festival, Klaus Biesenbach, Director of PS1 and Chief Curator of MoMA, led the brigade to Patti Smith and more on the Friday morning before the official opening on July 1st on board a ferry to get the first dibs on Kusama’s latest Instagram with him. Take an early look here at all of the stainless steel that’s likely to grace your lining by September.
Related: Part of a $ 1 million installation in Kusama that was damaged in a likely selfie accident
From London to Connecticut, it’s a takeover from Yayoi Kusama
Yayoi Kusama by Noriko Takasugi, 2014.
Photo © Noriko Takasugi.
Installation “All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins”, 2016, in “Yayoi Kusama” in Victoria Miro, London.
Courtesy of KUSAMA Enterprise, Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo / Singapore and Victoria Miro, London. © Yayoi Kusama.
“Yayoi Kusama: Narcissus Garden” at The Glass House, Connecticut. Photo by Matthew Placek.
“Yayoi Kusama: Narcissus Garden” at The Glass House, Connecticut. Photo by Matthew Placek.
Installation “Chandelier of Grief”, 2016, in “Yayoi Kusama” in Victoria Miro, London.
Courtesy of KUSAMA Enterprise, Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo / Singapore and Victoria Miro, London. © Yayoi Kusama.
“MY HEART’S ABODE”, acrylic on canvas, 2016, in “Yayoi Kusama” at Victoria Miro, London.
Courtesy of KUSAMA Enterprise, Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo / Singapore and Victoria Miro, London. © Yayoi Kusama.
“PUMPKIN”, steel sculpture, 2015, in “Yayoi Kusama: Narcissus Garden” at The Glass House, Connecticut. Photo by Matthew Placek.
Installation “All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins”, 2016, in “Yayoi Kusama” in Victoria Miro, London.
Courtesy of KUSAMA Enterprise, Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo / Singapore and Victoria Miro, London. © Yayoi Kusama.
“Where the Lights in My Hearts Go”, installation, 2016, in “Yayoi Kusama” in Victoria Miro, London.
Courtesy of KUSAMA Enterprise, Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo / Singapore and Victoria Miro, London. © Yayoi Kusama.
“SHEDDING TEARS TO THE SEASON”, acrylic on canvas, 2015, in “Yayoi Kusama” at Victoria Miro, London.
Courtesy of KUSAMA Enterprise, Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo / Singapore and Victoria Miro, London. © Yayoi Kusama.
“Yayoi Kusama: Narcissus Garden” at The Glass House, Connecticut. Photo by Matthew Placek.
“Pumpkin (S)”, highly polished bronze, 2016, in “Yayoi Kusama” at Victoria Miro, London.
Courtesy of KUSAMA Enterprise, Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo / Singapore and Victoria Miro, London. © Yayoi Kusama.
“Yayoi Kusama: Narcissus Garden” at The Glass House, Connecticut. Photo by Matthew Placek.
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