Yayoi Kusama — Most Known Japanese Female Artist
Today, the name of Yayoi Kusama resonates with
millions of people throughout the world. One of the most famous
female artists of the contemporary era, Yayoi Kusama has long been known
as an extraordinary and transcendent conceptual artist,
whose work is lauded as revolutionary.
Yayoi Kusama was born in Matsumoto in 1929. After
graduating from Matsumoto Girl’s High School, the young girl entered Kyoto
School of Arts and Crafts, where she studied traditional Japanese painting. Despite
her formal art education, Kusama is considered a self-taught artist as she
began painting as a child and developed her artistic
skills independently. It is interesting that many of Kusama’s works are inspired by hallucinations that she suffered from in childhood and afterward. Thus, dots, a product
of her hallucinations, were her starting point in art and became her distinct artistic
signature later in life.
Throughout her impressive career, Yayoi Kusama
has greatly contributed to contemporary
Japanese art, as well as to several specific movements, including
surrealism, futurism, minimalism, feminism, pop art, and her pivotal niche –
abstract expressionism. Her extensive portfolio may tell you a lot about the
artist, her life, and her attitude on a range of topics.
Numerous art installations and performances
organized by Kusama are imbued with autobiographical elements, to say nothing
of controversial political and sexual content. Some of the most known are her nude performances in 1960 in Central Park and the Brooklyn
Bridge to protest the Vietnam War.
The central
ideas standing behind Yayoi
Kusama’s art are intended to approach the infinity and eternity
of the human mind and soul. The artist has managed to mix deep personal
feelings with swirling abstract images. Probably, it
is her unique way to share the reflection of her own troubled life and let the
viewers once again feel the singularity of their own lives.