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Lot Essay
Yayoi Kusama, “The Queen of Polka-Dots,” is one of the most sought after contemporary artists. She is known for superimposing polka dots in her works, which range from paintings, sculptures, and installations to happenings and fashion. She studied the Japanese traditional art of nihonga painting before relocating to New York in 1957, where she learned contemporary Western art and began a controversial yet successful art career. If Kusama’s art is an expression of her life, the polka dots, a central motif in her career, can be viewed as the mandala in her universe.
Kusama believes that polka dots negate entry to a state of self-obliteration and enable one to become one with the universe. She explains, “The polka dot—a symbol of the sun, signifying masculine energy, the source of life, the shape of the moon, representing the feminine principle of reproduction and growth—the polka dot is all these things and more.” During the period 2009–2011, Kusama rehearsed and synthesized motifs from her early years, including flowers, eyes, and hieroglyphic portrait in profile, dots, and nets. This body of work, including Self Portrait, is marked by a visual contrast created by applying saturated colors on a smooth monochrome base. In the self-portrait, Kusama demonstrates her eccentric, playful, and vivid personality using her signature iconographic and formal inventions.
In Self Portrait, viewers can quickly notice Kusama’s bright orange hair. Upon a closer inspection, a green base has been applied by Kusama before outlining each hair strand in orange. The contrasting color palate not only draws attention to the fluorescent hair color but also accentuates the volume of her curly hair. As the queen of polka dots, Kusama highlights her identity by covering her skin in beige, yellow, and orange-dotted patterns. Self Portrait has been adorned with details that reflect the artist’s meticulous working method. The minute color details help create a wholesome pictorial plane of the unusual colors. For example, the hair, the lips, and the polka-dotted skin have been painted in the same shade of orange. Likewise, the same shade of electric purple outlines her eyes and brows and fills up the garment. The front view of the artist is positioned against a dark background with sprawling organic shapes, which are reminiscent of her Cosmos paintings. While the painting emerged from Kusama’s imagination, the use of vibrant colors, patterns, and composition is reminiscent of Le Berceuse, a portrait by Vincent van Gogh.
The artist states that the obsessive and exhaustive dotting is a gesture to alleviate her hallucination. The self-portraits mark important turning points in her artistic development. At the age of ten, Kusama drew a portrait of her mother, which seems to be one of her earliest experiments with the element of dots. The downcast face, the kimono, and the background are covered with patterns of misshapen dots. Another self-portrait that Kusama made in her 20s features a surreal transformation; she metamorphoses from herself into a pink sunflower surrounded by a circle of petals and a pink sealed lip. The background is lightly adorned with concentric circles, which resemble the endlessness presented in the Infinity Nets series. By painting a scene from the artist’s childhood nightmare, the self-portrait is an approach to overcome Kusama’s emotional trauma.
Kusama’s self-portrait perhaps shows the direct connection between her identity, her psychosomatic condition, and her artistic language. Kusama was 81 when she painted Self-Portrait. However, she presents herself as an ageless woman, embracing the vitality and energy that emanate from her repeating polka dots. Against a cosmic background, she gazes into space and contemplates existential issues in the vast universe. From her first dreamy sketch to a surreal painting and to a Kusama-style self-portrait, these portraits record different stages in Kusama’s life and her stylistic evolution. Rather than continue suffering from hallucinations, she has learned to live with her psyche peacefully. Executed in her late years, Self Portrait is a fusion of Kusama’s identities as a visual artist and as a human being.
Kusama believes that polka dots negate entry to a state of self-obliteration and enable one to become one with the universe. She explains, “The polka dot—a symbol of the sun, signifying masculine energy, the source of life, the shape of the moon, representing the feminine principle of reproduction and growth—the polka dot is all these things and more.” During the period 2009–2011, Kusama rehearsed and synthesized motifs from her early years, including flowers, eyes, and hieroglyphic portrait in profile, dots, and nets. This body of work, including Self Portrait, is marked by a visual contrast created by applying saturated colors on a smooth monochrome base. In the self-portrait, Kusama demonstrates her eccentric, playful, and vivid personality using her signature iconographic and formal inventions.
In Self Portrait, viewers can quickly notice Kusama’s bright orange hair. Upon a closer inspection, a green base has been applied by Kusama before outlining each hair strand in orange. The contrasting color palate not only draws attention to the fluorescent hair color but also accentuates the volume of her curly hair. As the queen of polka dots, Kusama highlights her identity by covering her skin in beige, yellow, and orange-dotted patterns. Self Portrait has been adorned with details that reflect the artist’s meticulous working method. The minute color details help create a wholesome pictorial plane of the unusual colors. For example, the hair, the lips, and the polka-dotted skin have been painted in the same shade of orange. Likewise, the same shade of electric purple outlines her eyes and brows and fills up the garment. The front view of the artist is positioned against a dark background with sprawling organic shapes, which are reminiscent of her Cosmos paintings. While the painting emerged from Kusama’s imagination, the use of vibrant colors, patterns, and composition is reminiscent of Le Berceuse, a portrait by Vincent van Gogh.
The artist states that the obsessive and exhaustive dotting is a gesture to alleviate her hallucination. The self-portraits mark important turning points in her artistic development. At the age of ten, Kusama drew a portrait of her mother, which seems to be one of her earliest experiments with the element of dots. The downcast face, the kimono, and the background are covered with patterns of misshapen dots. Another self-portrait that Kusama made in her 20s features a surreal transformation; she metamorphoses from herself into a pink sunflower surrounded by a circle of petals and a pink sealed lip. The background is lightly adorned with concentric circles, which resemble the endlessness presented in the Infinity Nets series. By painting a scene from the artist’s childhood nightmare, the self-portrait is an approach to overcome Kusama’s emotional trauma.
Kusama’s self-portrait perhaps shows the direct connection between her identity, her psychosomatic condition, and her artistic language. Kusama was 81 when she painted Self-Portrait. However, she presents herself as an ageless woman, embracing the vitality and energy that emanate from her repeating polka dots. Against a cosmic background, she gazes into space and contemplates existential issues in the vast universe. From her first dreamy sketch to a surreal painting and to a Kusama-style self-portrait, these portraits record different stages in Kusama’s life and her stylistic evolution. Rather than continue suffering from hallucinations, she has learned to live with her psyche peacefully. Executed in her late years, Self Portrait is a fusion of Kusama’s identities as a visual artist and as a human being.