Yayoi Kusama
born 1929
© Yayoi Kusama
License this image
© Yayoi Kusama
License this image
Biography
Yayoi Kusama (草間 彌生, Kusama Yayoi, born 22 March 1929) is a Japanese contemporary artist who works primarily in sculpture and installation, but is also active in painting, performance, film, fashion, poetry, fiction, and other arts. Her work is based in conceptual art and shows some attributes of feminism, minimalism, surrealism, Art Brut, pop art, and abstract expressionism, and is infused with autobiographical, psychological, and sexual content. She has been acknowledged as one of the most important living artists to come out of Japan.
Raised in Matsumoto, Kusama trained at the Kyoto School of Arts and Crafts in a traditional Japanese painting style called nihonga. Kusama was inspired, however, by American Abstract Impressionism. She moved to New York City in 1958 and was a part of the New York avant-garde scene throughout the 1960s, especially in the pop-art movement. Embracing the rise of the hippie counterculture of the late 1960s, she came to public attention when she organized a series of happenings in which naked participants were painted with brightly colored polka dots. Since the 1970s, Kusama has continued to create art, most notably installations in various museums around the world.
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Read full Wikipedia entryArtworks
Yayoi Kusama The Passing Winter
2005
Yayoi Kusama Infinity Mirrored Room - Filled with the Brilliance of Life
2011/2017
Yayoi Kusama Chandelier of Grief
2016/2018
Film and audio
Talking Point
Why I Love: Yayoi Kusama's The Passing Winter
Hear our staff talk about their favourite artworks
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Listen
Kusama curator’s talk and private view
Curator Frances Morris discusses and explores Yayoi Kusama’s life and work.
Watch
Kusama's Self Obliteration
This is the second of our blog posts relating to Yayoi Kusama and film, and here we present one of ...
TateShots
Yayoi Kusama's Obliteration Room
An entirely white space, furnished as a monochrome living room, is 'obliterated' with multi-coloured stickers
Watch
Yayoi Kusama: 9 February - 5 June 2012
The nine decades of Yayoi Kusama's life have taken her from rural Japan to the New York art scene ...
Features
List
How Kusama paved the way for art today
Discover three ways in which she revolutionised the art world
Blog
Kusama's relationship with Joseph Cornell
For an artist who advocated free love during her time as the high priestess of the hippies in late 1960s ...
Blog
Kusama and Fashion
In her ninth decade Kusama still displays her keen and unique fashion sense. She has always had an interest in ...
Essay
Kusama and anti-war activism
Yayoi Kusama has always had a strong political conscience, and has been vehemently opposed to war since her teens.
Tate Etc
Planting a seed: Yayoi Kusama at Tate Modern II
One of the Japanese artist’s earliest memories was of the seed-harvesting field in the plant nursery owned by her ...
Tate Etc
Infinity on a single canvas?: Yayoi Kusama at Tate Modern
One of Japan’s most prolific artists, Yayoi Kusama is probably best known for her spot-covered rooms and objects. On ...
Tate Etc
Tate Etc. issue 24: Spring 2012
Tate Etc. Issue 24, Spring 2012 edition, online verion of Tate's magazine
Tate Etc
The End of perspective?: Symmetry
When David Brewster invented the kaleidoscope in 1816 he created geometric imagery with light. The geometric art that followed played ...
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