I recently was in Hong Kong, and noticed they had replaced
my favorite Starbucks with a Louis Vuitton store. I had heard about the collaboration
between Yayoi Kusama and the famous brand, but I have to admit I was not that
impressed by the design.
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| Pacific Place, Hong Kong |
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| Short Hills Mall, New Jersey |
That was until I learned that the dots represented
reoccurring nightmares that Yayoi Kusama had suffered from almost her entire
life. Painting dots was Kusama’s way of coping with the consistent feeling that
an unknown force would destroy not only her, but also her family and entire
world. Many of her famous pieces
were inspired by childhood visions and hallucinations. Kusama spent almost
forty years of her life in an open ward of a mental institution, and said she
often viewed herself as “a dot lost among a million other dots.”
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| "Self-Obliteration" 1967 |
“My artwork is an expression of my life,
particularly of my mental disease… My art originates from hallucinations only I
can see. I translate the hallucinations and obsessional images that plague me
into sculptures and paintings.”
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| "Infinity Dots" 2007 |
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| Photo of Kusama reclining on "Accumulation No. 2" 1966 |
Once I learned all this, I looked at the design in a
completely different way. I myself have suffered from reoccurring nightmares
and understand how frightening and realistic they can seem. Kasuma clearly had
no control of the hallucinations and anxiety she was experiencing, and painting
was her way of identifying and facing her biggest fears. It’s amazing how much
my opinion of her art changed when I learned more about her.
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