10 Facts About Yayoi Kusama's Flowers

Kusama's approach to depicting flowers is as audacious as it is unique. She often opts for unconventional colour palettes, distancing her works from what would be typically associated with floral design. Her choice in unexpected hues challenges the viewer's perception and understanding of the flowers, often obscuring their distinct characteristics and intrinsic meanings. While Kusama's hallmark dots and infinity net patterns are prominently featured in her flower works, they are executed in a manner that is quintessentially Kusama, yet refreshingly novel.

I Spend Each Day Embracing Flowers introduced a spectrum of new works by the artist including her massive, kaleidoscopic flower sculptures. These pieces, immense in scale and bursting with vibrant colour, transformed the gallery into a mesmerising playground of flora. The choice of the exhibition's name was a fitting homage to these stunning centrepieces, emphasising Kusama's deep-rooted connection to nature in her artistry. The exhibition also featured a new infinity room in addition to Kusama’s treasured polka dot and pumpkin works.

Kusama's flower sculptures, celebrated for their immersive and interactive qualities, often invite viewers to engage in a spatial dialogue with the artworks. The intention behind the interactive design stems from her philosophical theme of self-obliteration – a dissolution of the self into the endless repetition and rhythm of patterns. As viewers navigate through these vibrantly dotted, oversized flora, they experience a moment where the boundaries between self and the other become blurred. Consequently, these physically engaging experiences foster reflections on unity, existence, and the infinite themes visited by Kusama throughout her career.

Kusama’s dichotomy between her flower sculptures and prints mirrors her multifaceted relationship with these botanical forms. The sculptures, with their immense, overbearing presence and vivid, almost surreal aesthetic, seem to manifest the artist's hallucinatory experiences and internal chaos perfectly. Conversely, her prints, with their celebration of colour and form, perhaps offer a glimpse into Kusama's appreciation and celebration of florals, delivering a more harmonious interaction with them. This divergence in representation allows viewers to engage with the paradoxical realms of fear and fascination that flowers occupy in Kusama's psyche and creative world.

Haunted by childhood hallucinations, where she was enveloped by overwhelming patterns, she could have been consumed by this fear. Instead, Kusama leveraged it, ingeniously flipping these very patterns and visions to her advantage. What once symbolised dread became a defining motif in her compositions, allowing her to turn haunting memories into iconic artistic trademarks. Through this metamorphosis, Kusama showcases the resilience and innovation at the heart of her artistry.

For collectors keen on enriching their portfolios with Kusama's works, Flowers 3 is an essential addition. Though it hasn’t taken the prize for a top auction record, over the past five years, this print has demonstrated an astounding 30% Average Annual Growth Rate (AAGR), proving its significant market and cultural value. The vibrant print shimmers throughout with a crimson red that transforms from a web of infinity nets to dots, depicting a striking still life composition of a flower, true to Kusama’s vision.

Kusama originally collaborated with Louis Vuitton in 2012 producing a variety of accessories and apparel covered in vivid polka dots. The artist’s floral designs have since been interpreted into silk scarves, bustiers, and psychedelic mini skirts. More recently she has been focused on developing an entire universe in her likeness through creating infinity with the longstanding fashion house.

Each piece in Kusama's floral collection, while maintaining a consistent technique, tells its own unique story. The works throughout her Flowers series exhibit standalone works like Flower C that command as much, if not more, presence than an entire bouquet. Conversely, pieces like Flowers 2 showcase a collective of blooms, each maintaining a distinct identity even within the group setting. Kusama’s nuanced presentations perhaps navigate through perceptions of isolation and collectivity, employing each flower as a metaphorical exploration into the dichotomies of individuality and togetherness within societal contexts.

In Japan, the revered Sakura (cherry blossom), among other flowers, stands as a symbol of the rhythmic ebb and flow of seasons. Kusama, embedded in this cultural narrative, infuses her art with these themes of change and transformation. Her floral works go beyond showcasing the physical beauty of flowers, spotlighting their cultural importance and reflecting the delicate equilibrium of change and continuity found in Japanese views on nature’s cycles.

In works like Flowers in a Polka Dot Vase and Flowers C, we see how Kusama integrates vases as prominent visual elements. Their deliberate inclusion becomes a strategy in enriching the aesthetic and conceptual depth of her artwork. These vases, introducing new patterns and manipulating light and shape, enhance the vibrancy and complexity of her flower series, often through her popular infinity net pattern.