Yayoi Kusama Is Back At David Zwirner This November

Just in time for fall, David Zwirner is hosting two major concurrent exhibitions of recent work by Yayoi Kusama on view across three gallery spaces in New York City: Festival of Life at 525 and 533 West 19th Street in Chelsea and Infinity Nets at the recently opened space on 34 East 69th Street on the Upper East Side.

The exhibitions feature sixty-six paintings from her iconic My Eternal Soul series, new large-scale flower sculptures, a polka-dotted environment, and two Infinity Mirror Rooms in the Chelsea locations, and a selection of new Infinity Nets paintings uptown.

The first Infinity Mirror exhibits invites the viewer to look inside through two peepholes, and the other is experienced from within. In the former, miniature light bulbs in changing colors reveal a hexagonal pattern that is mirrored endlessly. The latter encapsulates the visitor inside a large mirrored room with stainless steel balls suspended from the ceiling and arranged on the floor; an enclosed column within the room offers yet another mirrored environment accessible through peepholes. A sense of infinity is offered through the play of reflections between the circular shapes and the surrounding mirrors.

Kusama presented her first solo show in her native Japan in 1952 and ever since her work has been featured widely in both solo and group presentations. In the mid-1960s, she established herself in New York as an notable avant-garde artist by staging innovative and influential exhibitions and events. Her work gained widespread recognition in the late 1980s after countless international solo exhibitions, including shows at the Center for International Contemporary Arts, New York and the Museum of Modern Art, Oxford, England, both taking place in 1989.