Please view details of “Pumpkin” by Yayoi Kusama
Pumpkins have become a trademark of Yayoi Kusama, a Japanese contemporary artist, who was among the first experimenters in the performance and action art. For the first time pumpkins appeared in her art in 1946. It was regarded as “an example of Nihonga, the new, nationalistic style of traditional Japanese painting” as interpreted by the curator and critic Catherine Taft.
Environmental installation Mirror Room (Pumpkin) became famous after exhibited in the Japanese Pavilion at the 1993 Venice Biennale. Furthermore, Kusama created handed out little takeaway pumpkins for Biennale visitors.
The form and dots
Yayoi Kusama explained her love to pumpkins by its “humorous form, warm feeling, and a human-like quality and form”. Also, importantly, she appeals to the pumpkin’s “generous unpretentiousness”. Interestingly, almost all her artworks have dots and marks on them. As she told: “when we obliterate nature and our bodies with polka dots, we become part of the unity of our environment”.
Additionally, the artist is active in music, design, writing, video art and fashion. The art is her way to express psychological and mental problems. Especially she uses several recurring motifs – dots, eyes, nets and pumpkins. Her art includes works on paper, handheld figurines, towering sculptures, and room installations.
In 2021 there was Kusama’s exhibition in Tel Aviv Museum of Art organized by Gropius Bau, Berlin. It was her retrospective that brought together artworks produced over an eighty-year period.
Kings Gallery is a leading fine art gallery established in Jerusalem in 1995. We strive to collect and sell the highest quality historic and contemporary Israeli and International art. Especially, the gallery specializes in artists from the early period of the 1920’s. In addition, Kings allery features leading up-and-coming young artists who will definitely be prominent names in the next few years. Our address is 10 Shlomzion Hamalka st, Jerusalem.
