WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.139 Welcome back to the deep dive. Today we are we're 00:00:04.139 --> 00:00:07.280 stepping into a world that is just well it's 00:00:07.280 --> 00:00:09.220 visually vibrating. That's a great way to put 00:00:09.220 --> 00:00:13.240 it. It's a world of infinite reflections glowing 00:00:13.240 --> 00:00:16.940 lights and of course dots. I mean thousands and 00:00:16.940 --> 00:00:19.320 thousands of polka dots. Uncountable polka dots. 00:00:19.399 --> 00:00:23.399 Exactly. And if you have been anywhere near a 00:00:23.399 --> 00:00:26.879 major museum in the last say 10 years or honestly 00:00:26.879 --> 00:00:29.670 if you've just scrolled through Instagram. You 00:00:29.670 --> 00:00:31.910 have seen this work. Oh, it's unavoidable. Yeah. 00:00:32.009 --> 00:00:34.149 In the best way. Yeah. We are, of course, talking 00:00:34.149 --> 00:00:36.409 about the Princess of Polka Dots herself, Yayoi 00:00:36.409 --> 00:00:38.759 Kusama. And it is such a fascinating subject 00:00:38.759 --> 00:00:40.560 to tackle because when you think of Kusama, your 00:00:40.560 --> 00:00:43.119 mind probably jumps right to those iconic images. 00:00:43.240 --> 00:00:45.600 Right. The bright yellow pumpkins covered in 00:00:45.600 --> 00:00:47.899 black spots or maybe those mirrored rooms that 00:00:47.899 --> 00:00:49.820 feel like you're stepping into a galaxy. They 00:00:49.820 --> 00:00:51.759 seem to go on forever. And the thing is, she's 00:00:51.759 --> 00:00:54.060 currently acknowledged as the world's top selling 00:00:54.060 --> 00:00:57.079 female artist. And not just female artist, the 00:00:57.079 --> 00:01:00.759 most successful living artist, period. That's 00:01:00.759 --> 00:01:03.789 a staggering title. Which is huge, a massive 00:01:03.789 --> 00:01:06.590 title. But here's the hook. And this is the thing 00:01:06.590 --> 00:01:08.310 that really stops you in your tracks when you 00:01:08.310 --> 00:01:10.909 start digging into the research. While her art 00:01:10.909 --> 00:01:13.230 is selling for millions, while she's collaborating 00:01:13.230 --> 00:01:16.810 with these huge luxury brands like Louis Vuitton, 00:01:17.030 --> 00:01:19.530 she doesn't live in a penthouse in Manhattan 00:01:19.530 --> 00:01:22.230 or, you know, a villa in Tuscany. No, not at 00:01:22.230 --> 00:01:25.609 all. Since 1977, she has voluntarily lived in 00:01:25.609 --> 00:01:27.730 a mental health facility in Tokyo. That just, 00:01:27.829 --> 00:01:30.579 it reframes everything. For nearly 50 years, 00:01:30.659 --> 00:01:32.920 she has resided in this hospital by her own choice. 00:01:33.060 --> 00:01:35.040 It's her safe space. She wakes up in her room 00:01:35.040 --> 00:01:37.819 at the facility and she just walks a short distance 00:01:37.819 --> 00:01:40.799 to her studio every single day to work. The routine 00:01:40.799 --> 00:01:43.680 is the anchor. Completely. And that is our mission 00:01:43.680 --> 00:01:46.200 for this deep dive. We want to unpack how a young 00:01:46.200 --> 00:01:49.939 girl from rural Japan used actual terrifying 00:01:49.939 --> 00:01:52.819 hallucinations to fuel an artistic revolution. 00:01:53.000 --> 00:01:55.060 We have to. And we're going to look at her time 00:01:55.060 --> 00:01:58.310 in 1960s New York, which was... I mean, it was 00:01:58.310 --> 00:02:00.750 pivotal, it was wild, and honestly, it was pretty 00:02:00.750 --> 00:02:02.530 heartbreaking for her. And we have to talk about 00:02:02.530 --> 00:02:04.790 this concept she has, self -obliteration. It 00:02:04.790 --> 00:02:07.189 sounds, well, it sounds scary, almost nihilistic. 00:02:07.390 --> 00:02:10.469 It does, but it's the absolute key to unlocking 00:02:10.469 --> 00:02:13.750 her entire philosophy. So this isn't just an 00:02:13.750 --> 00:02:15.909 art history lesson for you. Not at all. This 00:02:15.909 --> 00:02:18.469 is a study of resilience. It's about the intersection 00:02:18.469 --> 00:02:21.909 of severe mental health struggles and breathtaking 00:02:21.909 --> 00:02:25.710 creativity and race. And frankly, it's a critique 00:02:25.710 --> 00:02:28.250 of the art market's long history of sexism and 00:02:28.250 --> 00:02:30.990 racism. It really is a history she experienced 00:02:30.990 --> 00:02:34.189 firsthand. So let's go back way back to the beginning, 00:02:34.310 --> 00:02:36.750 before the pumpkins, before New York, before 00:02:36.750 --> 00:02:40.030 the fame. We need to go to Matsumoto, Japan in 00:02:40.030 --> 00:02:43.270 1929. Right. So Yayu Kusama was born into a pretty 00:02:43.270 --> 00:02:45.409 well -off family. They were wealthy merchants 00:02:45.409 --> 00:02:47.849 who owned a plant nursery and a huge seed farm. 00:02:48.009 --> 00:02:49.870 So you have to imagine the setting. From day 00:02:49.870 --> 00:02:53.310 one, she is literally surrounded by plants, flowers, 00:02:53.650 --> 00:02:56.729 just fields and fields of zinnias and peonies. 00:02:56.849 --> 00:02:58.469 It sounds idyllic, doesn't it? Like something 00:02:58.469 --> 00:03:00.430 out of a fairy tale. It sounds beautiful, like 00:03:00.430 --> 00:03:03.150 a Studio Ghibli movie setting. But from what 00:03:03.150 --> 00:03:05.590 all the sources say, the reality inside the house 00:03:05.590 --> 00:03:08.310 was anything but. It was incredibly traumatic. 00:03:08.689 --> 00:03:11.270 Yeah, idyllic is not the word. Her family dynamics 00:03:11.270 --> 00:03:14.889 were, let's say, complicated. Complicated is 00:03:14.889 --> 00:03:17.770 being very generous. Extremely. The environment 00:03:17.770 --> 00:03:20.449 was a pressure cooker. Her mother was reportedly 00:03:20.449 --> 00:03:24.310 physically abusive and just intensely, viciously 00:03:24.310 --> 00:03:26.610 unsupportive of Yayo's art. I read that Kusama 00:03:26.610 --> 00:03:29.719 would be drawing pictures of, you know. The pumpkins 00:03:29.719 --> 00:03:31.819 or the flowers she saw in the nursery. And her 00:03:31.819 --> 00:03:33.520 mother would just rush in and snatch them away 00:03:33.520 --> 00:03:35.860 from her before she could finish. Just rip them 00:03:35.860 --> 00:03:38.740 up. Just to discourage her. To crush that impulse. 00:03:39.139 --> 00:03:41.599 Exactly. And that explains why she developed 00:03:41.599 --> 00:03:43.819 this lifelong habit of rushing to finish her 00:03:43.819 --> 00:03:46.139 art. It's not just a burst of passion. It was 00:03:46.139 --> 00:03:48.719 a panic -driven need to get the image out before 00:03:48.719 --> 00:03:50.680 it could be destroyed. And then there's the father. 00:03:50.860 --> 00:03:54.050 The father was a serial womanizer. And in a really, 00:03:54.090 --> 00:03:56.430 really disturbing twist that shaped Kusama's 00:03:56.430 --> 00:03:59.610 entire psyche, her mother would force young Yayoi 00:03:59.610 --> 00:04:01.949 to spy on her father's extramarital affairs. 00:04:02.189 --> 00:04:04.669 That is just horrific. To send a child to do 00:04:04.669 --> 00:04:06.509 that, I can't even imagine. It's psychological 00:04:06.509 --> 00:04:09.490 warfare on a child. And it had this profound 00:04:09.490 --> 00:04:13.430 lifelong impact. Kusama said very explicitly 00:04:13.430 --> 00:04:16.290 that this experience instilled in her a lifelong 00:04:16.290 --> 00:04:19.509 contempt for sexuality. A fear, really. A deep 00:04:19.509 --> 00:04:23.019 fear. She developed an intense phobia. of the 00:04:23.019 --> 00:04:26.019 male body specifically the phallus there's a 00:04:26.019 --> 00:04:28.459 quote where she says the sexual obsession and 00:04:28.459 --> 00:04:31.980 fear of sex sit side by side in me that's the 00:04:31.980 --> 00:04:34.620 core conflict so you have this high stress abusive 00:04:34.620 --> 00:04:37.339 environment and then right in the middle of all 00:04:37.339 --> 00:04:39.879 this family trauma the hallucinations start she's 00:04:39.879 --> 00:04:43.180 only what 10 years old about 10 yes and this 00:04:43.180 --> 00:04:46.339 is the true origin story of the polka dots this 00:04:46.339 --> 00:04:49.019 wasn't a cool aesthetic choice she made no she 00:04:49.019 --> 00:04:51.860 describes this pivotal moment She was sitting 00:04:51.860 --> 00:04:54.600 at the dining table looking at a red flower pattern 00:04:54.600 --> 00:04:57.720 on the tablecloth, just staring at it. And when 00:04:57.720 --> 00:04:59.199 she looked up... The pattern was everywhere. 00:04:59.839 --> 00:05:02.399 Everywhere. She saw that same red flower pattern 00:05:02.399 --> 00:05:04.920 covering the ceiling, then the windows, then 00:05:04.920 --> 00:05:06.939 the walls. And it didn't just stop there in the 00:05:06.939 --> 00:05:10.060 room. No. This is the terrifying part. She looked 00:05:10.060 --> 00:05:12.259 down and saw the pattern crawling over her own 00:05:12.259 --> 00:05:14.779 body, her clothes, her hands. She felt like the 00:05:14.779 --> 00:05:17.040 universe was being covered in these dots. She 00:05:17.040 --> 00:05:19.360 felt she was being... Obliterated. Completely 00:05:19.360 --> 00:05:22.459 erased. And this wasn't just, oh, I see spots. 00:05:22.740 --> 00:05:25.519 This was a full sensory overload. She talks about 00:05:25.519 --> 00:05:28.879 flashes of light, auras, dense fields of dots. 00:05:29.240 --> 00:05:31.279 She even said the violets in the fields would 00:05:31.279 --> 00:05:33.500 speak to her, that they had human -like faces. 00:05:33.839 --> 00:05:36.500 That is genuinely terrifying for a child. It's 00:05:36.500 --> 00:05:38.740 the definition of a waking nightmare. Yeah. The 00:05:38.740 --> 00:05:41.360 patterns threatened to engulf her. In one account, 00:05:41.459 --> 00:05:43.860 she ran upstairs to escape the spell of the red 00:05:43.860 --> 00:05:46.620 flyers, and she actually fell and sprained her 00:05:46.620 --> 00:05:50.290 ankle. This wasn't a daydream. It was a visceral, 00:05:50.329 --> 00:05:52.949 physical, frightening event. And so art became 00:05:52.949 --> 00:05:55.790 the only way out. The only way to cope. It was 00:05:55.790 --> 00:05:58.209 her escape mechanism. If she could paint the 00:05:58.209 --> 00:06:00.790 dots, if she could draw the nets she saw, then 00:06:00.790 --> 00:06:02.829 maybe she could control them. By capturing the 00:06:02.829 --> 00:06:04.730 fear on paper, she could keep it from swallowing 00:06:04.730 --> 00:06:07.490 her whole? Precisely. But then you have to layer 00:06:07.490 --> 00:06:09.410 on top of all of that the historical context. 00:06:09.930 --> 00:06:13.110 She's now entering her teenage years during World 00:06:13.110 --> 00:06:15.870 War II. Right. So at age 13, she's conscripted 00:06:15.870 --> 00:06:18.459 to work in a military factory. And she's sewing 00:06:18.459 --> 00:06:21.600 parachutes for the Japanese army. Can you imagine 00:06:21.600 --> 00:06:25.180 a more stark image? A young girl who was having 00:06:25.180 --> 00:06:28.240 these intense, colorful hallucinations, forced 00:06:28.240 --> 00:06:32.300 to sit in a dark factory, sewing gray silk parachutes 00:06:32.300 --> 00:06:34.699 for a war. She described her adolescence as being 00:06:34.699 --> 00:06:38.019 spent in closed darkness, just hearing air raid 00:06:38.019 --> 00:06:41.300 sirens constantly, seeing American B -29 bombers 00:06:41.300 --> 00:06:44.230 flying overhead. And that environment, the repression 00:06:44.230 --> 00:06:47.589 of the war, the trauma at home, it just solidified 00:06:47.589 --> 00:06:50.730 this desperate need for personal and creative 00:06:50.730 --> 00:06:53.149 freedom. She felt completely suffocated from 00:06:53.149 --> 00:06:56.129 all signs. So the war ends, she survives, and 00:06:56.129 --> 00:06:57.970 she tries to become an artist in post -war Japan. 00:06:58.129 --> 00:07:00.769 She studies Nihonga. Yes, which is a very traditional 00:07:00.769 --> 00:07:02.730 style of Japanese painting. She went to Kyoto 00:07:02.730 --> 00:07:05.399 to study it. But she hated it. despise it she 00:07:05.399 --> 00:07:07.800 found it far too restrictive the whole master 00:07:07.800 --> 00:07:10.899 disciple system the rigid rules about what materials 00:07:10.899 --> 00:07:14.680 you could use the specific techniques it didn't 00:07:14.680 --> 00:07:16.319 work for an artist who's trying to paint her 00:07:16.319 --> 00:07:18.339 own mind so she decided she had to leave she 00:07:18.339 --> 00:07:20.899 had to she famously said that japanese society 00:07:20.899 --> 00:07:24.620 at the time was in her words too small too servile 00:07:24.620 --> 00:07:27.420 too fetalistic and too scornful of women yeah 00:07:27.870 --> 00:07:29.850 She knew she had no future there. She makes a 00:07:29.850 --> 00:07:31.730 break for it, but before she leaves, she does 00:07:31.730 --> 00:07:33.930 something incredibly dramatic. It feels like 00:07:33.930 --> 00:07:36.709 a scene from a movie. It really does. She took 00:07:36.709 --> 00:07:39.129 thousands of her early works, thousands of drawings 00:07:39.129 --> 00:07:41.589 and paintings, down to the riverbank behind her 00:07:41.589 --> 00:07:44.689 family's house, and she burned them. A bonfire 00:07:44.689 --> 00:07:48.189 of her own art. It was a total clean slate, a 00:07:48.189 --> 00:07:51.370 funeral for her past self. She was severing ties 00:07:51.370 --> 00:07:54.110 completely. She was going to America, and as 00:07:54.110 --> 00:07:56.329 she put it, she was going to survive or die trying. 00:07:56.759 --> 00:07:59.180 She sewed dollar bills into the lining of her 00:07:59.180 --> 00:08:02.220 kimono and left. And she didn't just go blindly. 00:08:02.240 --> 00:08:05.199 She had this wild idea to reach out to Georgia 00:08:05.199 --> 00:08:07.079 O 'Keeffe. How does that even happen? It was 00:08:07.079 --> 00:08:09.100 a total Hail Mary pass. She was in a bookstore 00:08:09.100 --> 00:08:11.899 in Matsumoto, found a book of O 'Keeffe's paintings, 00:08:12.100 --> 00:08:14.699 and was just stunned by them. She felt a connection. 00:08:14.939 --> 00:08:17.100 She found her address and just wrote a letter. 00:08:17.300 --> 00:08:20.060 A young, unknown artist from rural Japan writing 00:08:20.060 --> 00:08:22.620 to one of the titans of American art. Seeking 00:08:22.620 --> 00:08:24.899 advice, you know, asking how to make it in the 00:08:24.899 --> 00:08:27.439 art world. And the most shocking part is that 00:08:27.439 --> 00:08:30.800 O 'Keefe wrote back. That's amazing. It is. O 00:08:30.800 --> 00:08:33.879 'Keefe was very kind, but also realistic. She 00:08:33.879 --> 00:08:36.820 warned Kusama that it was incredibly hard for 00:08:36.820 --> 00:08:39.019 artists in America to make a living, especially 00:08:39.019 --> 00:08:41.379 for a woman and a foreigner at that. But she 00:08:41.379 --> 00:08:44.100 didn't say don't come. No. And that correspondence 00:08:44.100 --> 00:08:46.740 gave Kusama the courage she needed. It was a 00:08:46.740 --> 00:08:49.620 lifeline. And O 'Keefe became a sort of mentor. 00:08:50.399 --> 00:08:53.000 Later on, when Kusama was in New York and basically 00:08:53.000 --> 00:08:55.659 starving, O 'Keeffe convinced her own art dealer 00:08:55.659 --> 00:08:58.399 to buy some of Kusama's work just to save her 00:08:58.399 --> 00:09:00.840 from financial ruin. That's a true act of solidarity. 00:09:01.159 --> 00:09:03.980 So 1957, she arrives in the U .S., first Seattle 00:09:03.980 --> 00:09:06.580 for a year, then the big move to New York City 00:09:06.580 --> 00:09:10.440 in 1958. And this is the absolute height of abstract 00:09:10.440 --> 00:09:13.179 expressionism. It's Pollock de Kooning Rothko. 00:09:13.340 --> 00:09:16.480 It is a swaggering macho boys club. And this 00:09:16.480 --> 00:09:18.419 is where she creates her first major breakthrough 00:09:18.419 --> 00:09:21.139 works, the Infinity Nets. Let's unpack what those 00:09:21.139 --> 00:09:22.879 are because they aren't the pumpkins yet. No, 00:09:22.980 --> 00:09:25.539 no pumpkins yet. These were paintings, but they 00:09:25.539 --> 00:09:28.139 were enormous. I mean, some canvases were 30 00:09:28.139 --> 00:09:30.639 feet long, just these vast fields of color. And 00:09:30.639 --> 00:09:33.490 they were just. covered in tiny loops of paint 00:09:33.490 --> 00:09:36.090 entirely covered in these small repeated web 00:09:36.090 --> 00:09:38.470 -like loops or nets of paint it was an obsessive 00:09:38.470 --> 00:09:41.389 act she would paint for 40 50 hours straight 00:09:41.389 --> 00:09:43.970 without sleeping without eating it goes right 00:09:43.970 --> 00:09:45.590 back to that hallucination of the tablecloth 00:09:45.590 --> 00:09:47.769 doesn't it it's a direct translation she was 00:09:47.769 --> 00:09:49.950 painting the net that she felt was covering the 00:09:49.950 --> 00:09:53.490 universe threatening to obliterate her and the 00:09:53.490 --> 00:09:56.169 critical reception surprisingly was very strong 00:09:56.539 --> 00:10:00.139 Really? In that macho art scene? Yes. The minimalist 00:10:00.139 --> 00:10:03.399 heavyweight Donald Judd, who later became a romantic 00:10:03.399 --> 00:10:05.659 partner for a time, he bought one and wrote a 00:10:05.659 --> 00:10:08.100 glowing review. The critic Herbert Reid praised 00:10:08.100 --> 00:10:10.860 them. She was even the only female artist in 00:10:10.860 --> 00:10:12.899 a really important group show in Amsterdam called 00:10:12.899 --> 00:10:16.600 Null or Zero in 1962. So she's getting critical 00:10:16.600 --> 00:10:19.120 respect. She's in the mix. She's not an outsider 00:10:19.120 --> 00:10:21.279 in that sense. She's in the critical conversation, 00:10:21.580 --> 00:10:25.169 yes. But she's making zero money. She talks in 00:10:25.169 --> 00:10:27.490 her autobiography about being so poor she would 00:10:27.490 --> 00:10:30.029 scavenge fish heads and cabbage leaves from the 00:10:30.029 --> 00:10:32.649 market garbage to make soup. She was freezing 00:10:32.649 --> 00:10:35.230 in her unheated loft. And then we get to the 00:10:35.230 --> 00:10:37.370 theft. This part of the story, I mean, it just 00:10:37.370 --> 00:10:40.250 makes my blood boil every time I read about it. 00:10:40.330 --> 00:10:42.649 It's a crucial turning point. And it explains 00:10:42.649 --> 00:10:44.929 so much of her later breakdown and paranoia. 00:10:44.929 --> 00:10:48.149 We're in the early 60s now. And Kusama moves 00:10:48.149 --> 00:10:51.570 from painting into sculpture. She starts making 00:10:51.570 --> 00:10:53.750 what she called soft sculptures. These are the 00:10:53.750 --> 00:10:55.950 objects covered in the white stuffed phallic 00:10:55.950 --> 00:10:58.309 shapes, right? Exactly. She would take everyday 00:10:58.309 --> 00:11:01.250 objects, an armchair, a ladder, a rowboat, shoes, 00:11:01.570 --> 00:11:04.649 and cover them in thousands of these white phallic 00:11:04.649 --> 00:11:06.950 protrusions that she sewed by hand from fabric. 00:11:07.190 --> 00:11:09.809 And this connects directly back to her fear of 00:11:09.809 --> 00:11:12.409 sex, her phobia. Directly. She called it accumulation. 00:11:13.260 --> 00:11:15.960 She said she was terrified of the phallus, so 00:11:15.960 --> 00:11:18.519 by making thousands of them, by surrounding herself 00:11:18.519 --> 00:11:20.879 with them, she was trying to conquer that fear 00:11:20.879 --> 00:11:23.000 through sheer repetition. It was kind of self 00:11:23.000 --> 00:11:25.679 -prescribed aversion therapy. Okay, so she's 00:11:25.679 --> 00:11:28.159 doing this absolutely groundbreaking, psychologically 00:11:28.159 --> 00:11:31.440 charged work. And then what happens with Clay 00:11:31.440 --> 00:11:34.940 Soldenberg? In 1963, Kusama has a show where 00:11:34.940 --> 00:11:36.980 she exhibits a couch completely covered in these 00:11:36.980 --> 00:11:40.049 phallic shapes. Clay Zoldenberg, who was already 00:11:40.049 --> 00:11:43.289 a very famous pop artist, was in the same group 00:11:43.289 --> 00:11:45.169 show. And what was his work like at the time? 00:11:45.389 --> 00:11:47.769 He was working with hard materials, plaster, 00:11:48.090 --> 00:11:52.750 bubble mache. He'd never made a soft sculpture 00:11:52.750 --> 00:11:55.190 before. I think I see where this is going. He 00:11:55.190 --> 00:11:57.129 saw Kusama's couch. It got all the attention. 00:11:57.710 --> 00:12:00.299 Shortly after that show... Oldenburg debuts his 00:12:00.299 --> 00:12:03.159 first soft sculptures, you know, the giant plush 00:12:03.159 --> 00:12:05.340 hamburgers, the soft telephone. It became his 00:12:05.340 --> 00:12:08.039 signature style, the thing that made him a global 00:12:08.039 --> 00:12:10.960 superstar. And it was Kusama's idea. It was so 00:12:10.960 --> 00:12:13.340 blatant that Oldenburg's wife at the time, Patty 00:12:13.340 --> 00:12:15.840 Musha, actually went up to Kusama at an exhibit 00:12:15.840 --> 00:12:18.600 and apologized. She basically said, I'm so sorry 00:12:18.600 --> 00:12:22.100 I took your idea. Wow. An apology. But that doesn't 00:12:22.100 --> 00:12:24.080 help her career. Not at all. And then it happened 00:12:24.080 --> 00:12:27.139 again with Andy Warhol. Oh, this is the wallpaper 00:12:27.139 --> 00:12:30.440 incident. Yes. Kusama did an installation called 00:12:30.440 --> 00:12:33.940 1 ,000 Boats. She took a real rowboat, covered 00:12:33.940 --> 00:12:36.679 it in her silver phalluses, and then she wallpapered 00:12:36.679 --> 00:12:39.899 the entire room, walls, ceiling, floor, with 00:12:39.899 --> 00:12:43.779 999 repeated silkscreen photocopies of the boat. 00:12:43.980 --> 00:12:46.919 It was the first immersive single -image environment. 00:12:47.240 --> 00:12:49.820 And who came to that exhibit? Andy Warhol. He 00:12:49.820 --> 00:12:51.740 came to the show, was incredibly enthusiastic, 00:12:52.059 --> 00:12:53.860 shouting how wonderful and brilliant it was. 00:12:54.159 --> 00:12:56.600 And just a short time after that, he has a show 00:12:56.600 --> 00:12:58.799 at another gallery where he covers all the walls 00:12:58.799 --> 00:13:01.840 with his now famous cow wallpaper. So you have 00:13:01.840 --> 00:13:05.059 Oldenburg taking the soft sculpture, Warhol taking 00:13:05.059 --> 00:13:07.779 the repeated wallpaper environment. And Kusama's 00:13:07.779 --> 00:13:10.179 just watching this happen. She fell into a deep, 00:13:10.279 --> 00:13:12.720 deep depression. She said she felt her innovations 00:13:12.720 --> 00:13:15.679 were being stolen by these white... male artists 00:13:15.679 --> 00:13:18.139 who were then catapulted to international stardom 00:13:18.139 --> 00:13:20.220 while she was still struggling to buy food. Experts 00:13:20.220 --> 00:13:22.659 who've looked at this, like curator Helene Posner, 00:13:22.779 --> 00:13:25.200 they point directly to the mix of sexism and 00:13:25.200 --> 00:13:27.759 racism in the art world at the time. Of course. 00:13:28.350 --> 00:13:31.190 She didn't have the institutional backing, the 00:13:31.190 --> 00:13:33.970 boys club support that those men got. She was 00:13:33.970 --> 00:13:36.590 this lone Japanese woman doing this incredibly 00:13:36.590 --> 00:13:40.149 strange, intense work. She was too easy to plagiarize 00:13:40.149 --> 00:13:42.289 and ignore. And it's just heartbreaking. She 00:13:42.289 --> 00:13:43.809 was literally trying to work through the idea 00:13:43.809 --> 00:13:45.950 of obliteration and she was being professionally 00:13:45.950 --> 00:13:49.639 obliterated. And ironically. That pressure led 00:13:49.639 --> 00:13:52.460 to her next great innovation. Sewing thousands 00:13:52.460 --> 00:13:54.820 of phalluses was physically grueling. It was 00:13:54.820 --> 00:13:57.700 painful. It took forever. So to solve that labor 00:13:57.700 --> 00:14:01.559 problem, she turned to mirrors. In 1965, she 00:14:01.559 --> 00:14:04.220 created her first infinity mirror room called 00:14:04.220 --> 00:14:07.460 Fally's Field. She filled a small mirrored room 00:14:07.460 --> 00:14:09.580 with her phallus -covered soft sculptures on 00:14:09.580 --> 00:14:12.860 the floor. And suddenly, with mirrors, she could 00:14:12.860 --> 00:14:16.029 create endless repetition, infinite space. Which 00:14:16.029 --> 00:14:18.190 became the precursor to the rooms that everyone 00:14:18.190 --> 00:14:20.509 lines up for today. But back then, she was pivoting 00:14:20.509 --> 00:14:22.450 again. She started moving away from the gallery 00:14:22.450 --> 00:14:24.210 scene. Well, she was so disillusioned, right? 00:14:24.250 --> 00:14:26.629 So she moved into the streets, the era of the 00:14:26.629 --> 00:14:29.350 happenings. This is the late 60s. The hippie 00:14:29.350 --> 00:14:32.509 counterculture is in full swing. And Kusama embraced 00:14:32.509 --> 00:14:36.610 it fully. She started organizing these wild performance 00:14:36.610 --> 00:14:39.529 art pieces in Central Park, on the Brooklyn Bridge, 00:14:39.710 --> 00:14:42.169 even crashing the Museum of Modern Art. And these 00:14:42.169 --> 00:14:45.860 involved a lot of polka dots. And a lot of public 00:14:45.860 --> 00:14:48.100 nudity. A lot of nudity. She would paint polka 00:14:48.100 --> 00:14:51.059 dots on the naked bodies of participants. These 00:14:51.059 --> 00:14:53.220 were often political protests against the Vietnam 00:14:53.220 --> 00:14:55.460 War. What was the connection there? The dots 00:14:55.460 --> 00:14:58.639 and the war? Her idea was that if we were all 00:14:58.639 --> 00:15:00.980 covered in the same polka dots, we lose our individual 00:15:00.980 --> 00:15:03.460 egos, we become one with the universe. And you 00:15:03.460 --> 00:15:05.580 can't fight a war if you're all just particles 00:15:05.580 --> 00:15:08.179 in the cosmos. It was her philosophy of self 00:15:08.179 --> 00:15:10.700 -obliteration made public and political. We have 00:15:10.700 --> 00:15:13.379 to talk about the letter to Richard Nixon. Because 00:15:13.379 --> 00:15:16.059 that is just... unbelievably bold. Chuckles. 00:15:16.120 --> 00:15:18.340 It really is. She wrote an open letter to then 00:15:18.340 --> 00:15:20.659 President Nixon and she offered to have sex with 00:15:20.659 --> 00:15:22.679 him if he would stop the Vietnam War. She actually 00:15:22.679 --> 00:15:24.500 wrote that. Oh, yeah. The quote is something 00:15:24.500 --> 00:15:26.340 like, let's forget ourselves, dearest Richard, 00:15:26.480 --> 00:15:28.659 and become one with the absolute all together 00:15:28.659 --> 00:15:31.779 in the... altogether. It was this mix of genuine 00:15:31.779 --> 00:15:34.559 anti -war sentiment and brilliant self -promotion. 00:15:34.639 --> 00:15:37.220 That is quite an offer. I am assuming he did 00:15:37.220 --> 00:15:39.360 not take her up on it. He did not respond, though. 00:15:39.639 --> 00:15:42.779 But it got her a lot of press. She also staged 00:15:42.779 --> 00:15:45.399 the grand orgy to awaken the dead at the MoMA 00:15:45.399 --> 00:15:48.679 in 1969. Wait, at the MoMA? Inside the museum? 00:15:48.919 --> 00:15:51.139 In the Sculpture Garden, yeah. She led a group 00:15:51.139 --> 00:15:54.200 of eight nude performers, her disciples, into 00:15:54.200 --> 00:15:56.779 the garden. They took off their clothes, stepped 00:15:56.779 --> 00:15:59.440 into the fountain, and started mimicking the 00:15:59.440 --> 00:16:02.600 poses of the famous sculptures by Malol and Picasso 00:16:02.600 --> 00:16:04.580 that were there. It was completely unannounced, 00:16:04.580 --> 00:16:07.320 right? A gorilla performed? Totally. It was scandalous. 00:16:07.360 --> 00:16:10.120 It was meant to be a critique of the stiff, dead 00:16:10.120 --> 00:16:12.340 institution of the museum. And then there was 00:16:12.340 --> 00:16:15.860 the Finesse Biennale in 1966. She wasn't officially 00:16:15.860 --> 00:16:18.379 invited to participate, was she? No, she just 00:16:18.379 --> 00:16:20.460 showed up. This was her piece, Narcissus Garden. 00:16:20.659 --> 00:16:24.120 She got some funding, had 1 ,500 plastic mirrored 00:16:24.120 --> 00:16:26.840 balls made, and set them up on the lawn outside 00:16:26.840 --> 00:16:29.139 the Italian pavilion. And she stood there in 00:16:29.139 --> 00:16:31.679 a gold kimono. Selling the balls to passersby 00:16:31.679 --> 00:16:35.460 for $2 each. $2? Yeah. She had a sign that said, 00:16:35.620 --> 00:16:39.860 Your Narcissism for Sale. It was this brilliant, 00:16:39.899 --> 00:16:42.879 biting critique of the art market's commercialism. 00:16:43.120 --> 00:16:45.820 She was literally selling people their own reflection 00:16:45.820 --> 00:16:48.100 for cash. The organizers must have loved that. 00:16:48.279 --> 00:16:49.860 Oh, they shut her down immediately. Yeah. They 00:16:49.860 --> 00:16:51.460 said, you can't sell art like you're selling 00:16:51.460 --> 00:16:53.759 hot dogs or ice cream cones at the Biennale. 00:16:54.259 --> 00:16:56.419 But the point was made. But while she's making 00:16:56.419 --> 00:16:58.860 all these splashes in New York, getting famous 00:16:58.860 --> 00:17:02.200 as this avant -garde provocateur, the reaction 00:17:02.200 --> 00:17:05.779 back home in Japan was not so great. It was devastating 00:17:05.779 --> 00:17:08.869 for her and her family. The news of her nude 00:17:08.869 --> 00:17:12.309 happenings and orgies reached Japan's conservative 00:17:12.309 --> 00:17:14.890 society. It brought immense shame to her family. 00:17:15.049 --> 00:17:16.549 I read that her high school actually removed 00:17:16.549 --> 00:17:19.190 her name from the alumni list. They did. They 00:17:19.190 --> 00:17:21.579 completely disowned her. She was a pariah. And 00:17:21.579 --> 00:17:23.660 all this time, her mental health was really, 00:17:23.759 --> 00:17:26.559 really deteriorating. Constantly. She was hospitalized 00:17:26.559 --> 00:17:28.819 regularly for exhaustion and overwork. She was 00:17:28.819 --> 00:17:32.240 attempting suicide. And her one real anchor in 00:17:32.240 --> 00:17:34.960 this very chaotic world was her relationship 00:17:34.960 --> 00:17:37.700 with the reclusive artist Joseph Cornell. He 00:17:37.700 --> 00:17:40.099 was much older than her, right? 26 years older. 00:17:40.220 --> 00:17:42.960 It was a very passionate but entirely platonic 00:17:42.960 --> 00:17:45.900 relationship. Her phobia of sex prevented anything 00:17:45.900 --> 00:17:48.809 physical, but they were inseparable. They sketched 00:17:48.809 --> 00:17:51.089 each other, wrote letters every day. He was her 00:17:51.089 --> 00:17:53.609 emotional support. And when he died in 1972, 00:17:53.950 --> 00:17:56.170 she just she lost her footing in New York. So 00:17:56.170 --> 00:18:00.089 1973, she returns to Japan. And this starts what 00:18:00.089 --> 00:18:02.789 biographers call the crash period. It's a complete 00:18:02.789 --> 00:18:05.170 crash. She goes back in ill health, both physically 00:18:05.170 --> 00:18:07.589 and mentally. And the reception in Japan was 00:18:07.589 --> 00:18:11.210 just. The press labeled her a scandal queen. 00:18:11.450 --> 00:18:13.309 She couldn't get her career going again. No. 00:18:13.490 --> 00:18:16.130 She was deeply depressed. She was unable to paint. 00:18:16.329 --> 00:18:18.930 She tried to start an art dealing business and 00:18:18.930 --> 00:18:22.309 it failed. She attempted suicide again. It really 00:18:22.309 --> 00:18:25.049 seemed like her career and maybe her life was 00:18:25.049 --> 00:18:27.309 over. She was largely forgotten by the Western 00:18:27.309 --> 00:18:29.609 art world and completely rejected by the Japanese 00:18:29.609 --> 00:18:31.490 art world. And then comes the decision that changes 00:18:31.490 --> 00:18:34.710 everything. The year is 1977. She finds a doctor 00:18:34.710 --> 00:18:37.440 who is pioneering the use of art therapy. And 00:18:37.440 --> 00:18:39.559 she makes a radical choice. She checks herself 00:18:39.559 --> 00:18:41.859 into the Sewa Hospital for the Mentally Ill in 00:18:41.859 --> 00:18:44.440 Tokyo. And a while later, she decides to stay. 00:18:44.579 --> 00:18:47.309 And she has been there ever since. By her own 00:18:47.309 --> 00:18:50.150 choice. By choice. It provided a structure, the 00:18:50.150 --> 00:18:52.589 safety, the quiet she needed to survive. Her 00:18:52.589 --> 00:18:55.230 studio is just a short walk away. She's built 00:18:55.230 --> 00:18:57.250 a life where she can manage her illness and create 00:18:57.250 --> 00:19:00.549 her art. She says, I fight pain, anxiety and 00:19:00.549 --> 00:19:03.490 fear every day. And the only method I have found 00:19:03.490 --> 00:19:05.529 that relieved my illness is to keep creating 00:19:05.529 --> 00:19:08.029 art. And during those early years in the hospital, 00:19:08.069 --> 00:19:11.029 when the art world had kind of moved on. She 00:19:11.029 --> 00:19:13.250 didn't stop working. She just changed her medium. 00:19:13.470 --> 00:19:15.829 She became a writer. She did. A very prolific 00:19:15.829 --> 00:19:19.109 one. She wrote these shocking, visceral, surreal 00:19:19.109 --> 00:19:22.910 novels and poetry. Books with titles like Manhattan's 00:19:22.910 --> 00:19:25.690 Suicide Addict and The Hustler's Grotto of Christopher 00:19:25.690 --> 00:19:28.589 Street. They kept her creative spark alive when 00:19:28.589 --> 00:19:30.799 painting was too difficult. We should note, though, 00:19:30.839 --> 00:19:32.579 there is a controversy that has come up around 00:19:32.579 --> 00:19:35.140 this literary period. Yes, and it's very important 00:19:35.140 --> 00:19:37.740 to mention it. In her 1983 autobiography and 00:19:37.740 --> 00:19:39.720 some of her other early writings, there were 00:19:39.720 --> 00:19:42.859 some undeniably racist comments about black people. 00:19:43.000 --> 00:19:45.339 It's a really difficult aspect of her legacy 00:19:45.339 --> 00:19:48.700 to reconcile, especially given her whole counterculture, 00:19:48.759 --> 00:19:51.859 love and peace persona from the 60s. Absolutely. 00:19:52.410 --> 00:19:55.450 In late 2023, after these writings came to wider 00:19:55.450 --> 00:19:58.589 attention, she did issue an apology for the remarks, 00:19:58.750 --> 00:20:01.569 expressing deep regret. But it's a really important 00:20:01.569 --> 00:20:04.769 reminder that even figures we view as these progressive 00:20:04.769 --> 00:20:07.769 revolutionaries can hold deep -seated and harmful 00:20:07.769 --> 00:20:10.269 prejudices. Right. It's part of the whole complicated 00:20:10.269 --> 00:20:12.950 picture of who she is. So she's in the hospital. 00:20:12.970 --> 00:20:15.799 She's writing. How does she get from being this 00:20:15.799 --> 00:20:18.720 forgotten scandal queen to being on Louis Vuitton 00:20:18.720 --> 00:20:21.200 handbags? What's the turning point? It was a 00:20:21.200 --> 00:20:23.559 very slow climb back. For most of the 70s and 00:20:23.559 --> 00:20:27.819 80s, she was in obscurity. But in 1989, a retrospective 00:20:27.819 --> 00:20:29.579 at the Center for International Contemporary 00:20:29.579 --> 00:20:32.099 Arts in New York sort of reintroduced her to 00:20:32.099 --> 00:20:34.619 the West. But the really big moment was 1993. 00:20:35.079 --> 00:20:37.519 That was the game changer. She was chosen to 00:20:37.519 --> 00:20:39.880 represent Japan. at the Venice Biennale. The 00:20:39.880 --> 00:20:42.180 very same place she was kicked out of for selling 00:20:42.180 --> 00:20:45.299 mirrored balls in 1966. The exact same place. 00:20:45.460 --> 00:20:47.920 And this time she had her own pavilion. She was 00:20:47.920 --> 00:20:50.039 the first woman to represent Japan with a solo 00:20:50.039 --> 00:20:52.799 exhibition. That brought her back onto the global 00:20:52.799 --> 00:20:55.660 stage in a massive way. And that's when the pumpkins 00:20:55.660 --> 00:20:58.099 really started to become her icon. The pumpkins. 00:20:58.200 --> 00:21:01.400 They are so iconic. Why pumpkins? Of all the 00:21:01.400 --> 00:21:03.220 things in her childhood nursery, why did that 00:21:03.220 --> 00:21:05.940 stick? She's just always loved them. She says 00:21:05.940 --> 00:21:07.660 her grandfather used to take her to the seed 00:21:07.660 --> 00:21:09.380 harvesting grounds and there would be these fields 00:21:09.380 --> 00:21:11.579 of them. To her, they represent a kind of alter 00:21:11.579 --> 00:21:14.019 ego. She finds them humorous, warm, comforting. 00:21:14.380 --> 00:21:17.079 She's called their form generous unpretentiousness. 00:21:17.279 --> 00:21:19.000 And that's when she installed the famous yellow 00:21:19.000 --> 00:21:22.880 one on Naoshima Island in Japan in 1994. Yes, 00:21:22.880 --> 00:21:24.640 the one at the end of the pier staring out at 00:21:24.640 --> 00:21:27.490 the sea. It became this huge. pilgrimage site 00:21:27.490 --> 00:21:30.150 for art lovers it actually got washed away in 00:21:30.150 --> 00:21:32.329 a typhoon a few years ago but it was so beloved 00:21:32.329 --> 00:21:34.509 they reinstated it and from there the commercial 00:21:34.509 --> 00:21:38.710 success just it exploded it did white num 28 00:21:38.710 --> 00:21:41.390 one of those early infinity net paintings sold 00:21:41.390 --> 00:21:45.119 for 7 .1 million dollars in 2014 As of 2012, 00:21:45.279 --> 00:21:47.220 she already had the highest turnover of any living 00:21:47.220 --> 00:21:50.119 female artist. And then, yes, the Louis Vuitton 00:21:50.119 --> 00:21:52.940 collaborations. The first one was in 2012 with 00:21:52.940 --> 00:21:55.420 Marc Jacobs, and then again in 2023. Suddenly, 00:21:55.460 --> 00:21:58.500 her dots were everywhere. On handbags, on storefronts, 00:21:58.500 --> 00:22:00.720 you had George Clooney and ads covered in her 00:22:00.720 --> 00:22:03.500 dots. She became a global brand. But the most 00:22:03.500 --> 00:22:06.000 fascinating part of this revival to me is the 00:22:06.000 --> 00:22:08.920 Instagram era. Her work feels like it was almost 00:22:08.920 --> 00:22:11.579 designed for social media decades before it existed. 00:22:11.839 --> 00:22:14.359 That is the great irony of her late career fame. 00:22:14.750 --> 00:22:17.369 The infinity mirror rooms became these unbelievable 00:22:17.369 --> 00:22:21.190 viral sensations. Museums like the Broad in L 00:22:21.190 --> 00:22:24.349 .A. or the Hirshhorn in D .C. had lines around 00:22:24.349 --> 00:22:27.369 the block with timed 30 -second tickets. For 00:22:27.369 --> 00:22:29.450 the perfect selfie. For the perfect selfie. And 00:22:29.450 --> 00:22:31.630 then you have the obliteration room where visitors 00:22:31.630 --> 00:22:34.430 enter a completely white domestic space and are 00:22:34.430 --> 00:22:36.630 given colorful dot stickers to place anywhere 00:22:36.630 --> 00:22:39.230 they want. It's pure engagement bait. It's interactive. 00:22:39.390 --> 00:22:41.490 It's colorful. But there's a much deeper meaning 00:22:41.490 --> 00:22:43.329 there that maybe the selfie takers are missing. 00:22:43.680 --> 00:22:45.920 Let's talk about that, because her work, these 00:22:45.920 --> 00:22:49.039 rooms, they were created out of a fear of self 00:22:49.039 --> 00:22:51.839 -obliteration. They were expressions of isolation, 00:22:52.279 --> 00:22:55.000 of anxiety, of the feeling of losing your ego 00:22:55.000 --> 00:22:57.400 and dissolving into the infinite. And now people 00:22:57.400 --> 00:23:00.000 use them to perfectly frame themselves, to center 00:23:00.000 --> 00:23:03.299 themselves in a photo. Look at M .E. in the infinity. 00:23:03.579 --> 00:23:05.920 The ultimate act of self -promotion. Exactly. 00:23:06.059 --> 00:23:09.940 Her 1966 piece, Narcissus Garden, was a critique 00:23:09.940 --> 00:23:13.029 of narcissism. Now her work has become the ultimate 00:23:13.029 --> 00:23:15.950 backdrop for digital narcissism. It's a really 00:23:15.950 --> 00:23:18.509 strange and fascinating evolution. So let's dig 00:23:18.509 --> 00:23:20.750 into the philosophy of self -obliteration a bit 00:23:20.750 --> 00:23:22.809 deeper, because it's not just about disappearing 00:23:22.809 --> 00:23:25.230 or dying. No, not at all. She has this great 00:23:25.230 --> 00:23:28.589 quote, polka dots are a way to infinity. What 00:23:28.589 --> 00:23:31.470 does that mean to her? Well, she sees the dot 00:23:31.470 --> 00:23:33.950 as having this dual form. It's the sun, which 00:23:33.950 --> 00:23:37.170 is energy and life, and it's also the moon, which 00:23:37.170 --> 00:23:40.000 is calm and serene. So when she covers a room 00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:42.500 or a body or a canvas in these dots, the individual 00:23:42.500 --> 00:23:46.059 ego, the self, it disappears. You become part 00:23:46.059 --> 00:23:47.819 of the environment. You become part of the larger 00:23:47.819 --> 00:23:50.119 universe. So it's almost a spiritual unification, 00:23:50.200 --> 00:23:52.940 a kind of Buddhist concept of oneness. In a way, 00:23:53.019 --> 00:23:55.359 yes. But it's always rooted in her disability, 00:23:55.599 --> 00:23:58.660 in her mental illness. The curator, Mika Yoshitake, 00:23:58.720 --> 00:24:00.619 made a really great point that these immersive 00:24:00.619 --> 00:24:03.220 works are designed to make the audience sympathize 00:24:03.220 --> 00:24:04.980 with her intrusive thoughts and hallucinations. 00:24:05.180 --> 00:24:07.599 She wants you to feel what she feels. She wants 00:24:07.599 --> 00:24:11.019 you to feel that disorientation, that sense of 00:24:11.019 --> 00:24:14.279 endless, overwhelming repetition. So when we 00:24:14.279 --> 00:24:16.359 walk into one of those mirror rooms, we are, 00:24:16.539 --> 00:24:19.700 in a sense, stepping inside her hallucinations. 00:24:19.859 --> 00:24:22.160 And art becomes medicine. It is her medicine. 00:24:22.319 --> 00:24:24.420 She says she doesn't see art as an end in itself. 00:24:24.680 --> 00:24:27.640 For her, it is a means to address the illness 00:24:27.640 --> 00:24:30.579 that originated in her childhood. It is, quite 00:24:30.579 --> 00:24:33.769 simply, survival. That puts a completely different 00:24:33.769 --> 00:24:36.170 spin on the fun polka dots in the cool mirror 00:24:36.170 --> 00:24:38.769 rooms. You aren't just looking at pretty colors. 00:24:38.809 --> 00:24:41.690 You are standing inside someone's trauma that 00:24:41.690 --> 00:24:44.490 they have managed to externalize to stay alive. 00:24:44.769 --> 00:24:46.569 It absolutely does. It makes the work so much 00:24:46.569 --> 00:24:49.269 more powerful and incredibly poignant. So to 00:24:49.269 --> 00:24:51.920 recap. We have gone from a little girl in a seed 00:24:51.920 --> 00:24:54.019 farm, seeing the tablecloth pattern crawl up 00:24:54.019 --> 00:24:57.019 her arms, to a dark parachute factory during 00:24:57.019 --> 00:25:00.359 a war, to the cutthroat sexist art world of 60s 00:25:00.359 --> 00:25:02.819 New York, to being forgotten and checking herself 00:25:02.819 --> 00:25:05.720 into a mental hospital in Tokyo, and then finally 00:25:05.720 --> 00:25:08.559 to absolute global domination as the world's 00:25:08.559 --> 00:25:10.599 most successful living artist. It is one of the 00:25:10.599 --> 00:25:12.819 most remarkable trajectories in all of art history. 00:25:12.900 --> 00:25:15.339 It's just a story of sheer, unbelievable endurance. 00:25:15.660 --> 00:25:17.640 I can't think of another one quite like it. It 00:25:17.640 --> 00:25:19.740 really is unique. So here's a final... thought 00:25:19.740 --> 00:25:22.019 for you to take with you the next time you see 00:25:22.019 --> 00:25:24.839 a yayoi kusama pumpkin or you see a friend post 00:25:24.839 --> 00:25:27.640 that perfect selfie from an infinity mirror room 00:25:27.640 --> 00:25:30.640 just pause for a second right we see these works 00:25:30.640 --> 00:25:37.500 now as so joyful so colorful so instagrammable 00:25:37.500 --> 00:25:42.319 but knowing what we know now that they stem from 00:25:42.319 --> 00:25:45.660 terrifying hallucinations from abuse from a desperate 00:25:45.660 --> 00:25:48.880 fear of being obliterated Does that change how 00:25:48.880 --> 00:25:51.059 we look at them? It has to, doesn't it? And it 00:25:51.059 --> 00:25:53.480 raises a question. When we engage with her work, 00:25:53.539 --> 00:25:55.940 are we participating in her healing process or 00:25:55.940 --> 00:25:58.180 are we just consuming her trauma because it looks 00:25:58.180 --> 00:26:00.880 cool on our feed? Is it sympathy or is it just 00:26:00.880 --> 00:26:02.519 aesthetics? That's the question. Look a little 00:26:02.519 --> 00:26:04.420 closer at the dots next time. Thanks for listening 00:26:04.420 --> 00:26:05.960 to this deep dive. See you next time.