The National Gallery Singapore will be putting on exhibit 120 of the artist’s works spanning seven decades in a show called ‘Yayoi Kusama: Life is the Heart of a Rainbow’.
Japan’s queen of eccentric and polkadots Yayoi Kusama will be getting her first major retrospective exhibition in Southeast Asia in Singapore this June.
The National Gallery Singapore will be putting on exhibit 120 of the writer and artist’s works spanning seven decades of her career in a show called ‘Yayoi Kusama: Life is the Heart of a Rainbow’.
Curated by the gallery’s own Russel Storer and Adele Tan, the blockbuster, running from June 10 – September 3, will feature 120 paintings, sculptures, videos and installations from the 1950’s to present. This will include new artworks that recently made headlines as well as those that have been in storage for years.
“Her personal experiences – from growing up in Japan during World War II, to her success as an Asian female artist in New York and Europe in the 1960s and involvement in social movements of the late 1960s and 1970s – and the resulting art has amazed and inspired millions around the world,” a museum representative has been reported as saying.
From Louis Vuitton bags to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, Kusama has lent her now signature polka dot and pumpkin motifs to art in all shapes and sizes, all over the world. There are two ongoing exhibitions on the 87-year-old’s works – one at Washington’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden and the other at Tokyo’s National Art Centre.
Kusama found a strong fanbase in artists and the regular person alike because of her life story that entailed all sorts of hardships through the wars as well as her own battle against severe psychological difficulties. Her art helps her cope and has often been cited by the artist herself as her escape from her mental disorders.
Keep updated at the official National Gallery Singapore website here.