Gallery Girl: Yayoi Kusama at David Zwirner (Part II)

Read Part I: “I Who Have Arrived in Heaven.”

“By obliterating one’s individual self, one returns to the infinite universe.”

I get the hype surrounding Yayoi Kusama’s “Infinity Mirrored Room” (specifically “The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away”); it’s otherworldly, said to be a reflection on death and the afterlife in all its cosmic, seemingly infinite (but in reality, intimate) glory. A few stolen glances while the Fox News crew was being ushered into the planetarium confirmed it was indeed as magical as lucky visitors claimed it to be.

I don’t doubt that it’s a unique—transcendental for some, even—experience, but a large part of me can’t help but think that its conduciveness to #selfies are largely a part of why the “Infinity Mirrored Rooms” have become the art attraction of the year. It’s taken social media by storm, and the crowd isn’t the usual gallery frequenters: it’s tourists, art students, Kusama followers, and hoards of hip guys and girls armed with a fully charged iPhones.

I would have loved that one minute in the mirrored room, but really, the neon exhibit was just as brilliant. Another mirrored exhibit, “Love is Calling” features amazing nylon, tentacle-like structures that grow from the ground up and ceiling down. Each is bespeckled with the signature Kusama polka dots, said to be a direct reflection of her “visions and hallucinations.” (Only by recreating what she saw was she able to maintain some control over her mind, hence the recurring polka-dot theme throughout her lifetime thus far as an artist). It’s an entirely different experience of course: it still marries the concept of art and immersion in the artist’s vision to feed the senses, but where “The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away” captures existentialism, “Love is Calling” is perverse, kind of twisted, but seasoned with a dash of dark humor.

You are Alice in Yayoi Kusama’s Wonderland.

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Visit Yayoi Kusama’s “I Who Have Arrived in Heaven” exhibit from now until Dec. 21, 2013.

xx