Polka Dot Superstar: The Amazing World of Yayoi Kusama

# Love in a field of polka dots. #

Yayoi Kusama is one of the most successful abstract artists

in the world today.

Born in pre-war Japan, and a star of the 1960s New York art scene,

Kusama is famous for the psychedelic polka dots

that swarm across her distinctive canvases, sculptures

and art installations.

At 85 years old, her work still crackles with energy.

# Walls and curtains

# Everything you're frightened of

# Is covered in polka dots

# Swollen pumpkins

# Sweet potato phalluses

# Nothing to be frightened of...

# Now. #

For me, Kusama's work is always of its age

and it's always a young artist's work of its age

and I think that's extraordinary.

Despite her increasing physical frailty

and wide-eyed, naive manners,

this is a woman consumed with a burning sense of purpose

and ambition.

Ahead of you at 850,000, 900,000, 950,000

Kusama's delirious, abstract creations fetch

record-breaking sums at auction and are snapped up by collectors.

I bought this one.

Isn't it wonderful?

Her world is colourful, playful and seemingly joyful,

but appearances can be deceptive.

Kusama's work is rooted in a much darker, more traumatic place.

Car manufacturers, movie stars

and designers clamour to collaborate with Kusama.

Yet she is preoccupied by more cosmic possibilities.

A universe of swirling particles, a heaven of polka dots.

# There is a world of polka dots

# Where everything disappears. #

Well into her 9th decade, Kusama is still driven by her need to create.

Her passion for painting overrides the physical challenges

that come with advancing years.

In 2009, she embarked on an epic project of 100 large canvases

that would eventually culminate in a sell-out exhibition

at Tate Modern.

Kusama works directly onto bright single-colour backgrounds

prepared by her team.

She uses quick-drying acrylic paint applied freehand

onto the canvases without preparatory sketches.

These large canvases are 2 metres square.

Kusama finds it easiest to paint sitting on an office chair

with an assistant wheeling her into position.

Mid project, Frances Morris,

the curator of the Tate exhibition, visits Kusama's studio.

Hello, hello, Frances Morris and Rachel.

-Thank you very much for coming to see us.

-No, thank you for...!

It's a very special day for us, to meet you for the first time.

We are very excited

and very grateful that you have made this opportunity for us.

Kusama had been painting on an almost industrial scale,

working daily to produce the 100 canvases.

The scope of the project was a challenge,

even for an institution the size of Tate Modern.

We wish we could show a lot of paintings close together,

very intense. They look fantastic like this.

ASSISTANT TRANSLATES

-KASUMA'S ASSISTANT:

-Do you think these paintings are fantastic?

Yeah. They're more than fantastic.

ASSISTANT TRANSLATES

I think what the problem...the challenge

is there is almost too much good work.

ASSISTANT TRANSLATES

She wants to show all of them.

I know, I know.

For me, there's a huge amount of work to do

because one of the things I've realised

during the course of these three days

is that the published material on Kusama

does not adequately cover her career and her history

at any moment in time.

So, I'm learning new things every day.

I'm aware that it is a huge challenge.

Kusama lives and works in Japan.

Her paintings are created in a purpose-built studio in Tokyo.

But her prolific output also includes novels, poems,

films, fashion and sculpture.

Kusama is visiting the Toyko factory

where her latest creations of flowers and dogs

are being given their high-gloss finish.

Kusama relies on her assistants to complete her trademark sculptures

to her exacting standards.

She's on hand to apply the finishing touches.

Kusama's fantastical, candy-coloured sculptures of dogs,

flowers, pumpkins and children have become sought-after centre-pieces

of civic plazas and public buildings across the globe.

While her trademark polka dots are known internationally,

Kusama herself has become a celebrity.

She's the object of intense public and press curiosity

both abroad and in Japan.

Yayoi Kusama was born in 1929 in the central Japanese city of Matsumoto.

She was the youngest daughter of a wealthy and conservative family,

who owned a large horticultural business.

The business is still in the family, now run by Kusama's nephew.

Kusama's early life in rural Japan was one surrounded by plants

and flowers, outlined in beautiful, confident line drawings

in her sketchbooks.

But it was also a childhood haunted by obsessive thoughts

and terrifying hallucinations.

It would be the start of a lifelong battle with mental illness.

Kusama recounts her first childhood vision.

With no vocabulary to express her fears,

Kusama began to recreate these patterns in her drawings.

She drew this uneasy portrait of her mother when she was 10 years old.

Her mother's face and kimono are covered in dots.

Prefiguring the polka dot motif that would later make her name,

but suggesting a darker, more troubled source

than the playful psychedelia of popular perception.

Kusama's parents had an unhappy marriage.

Her father was constantly unfaithful.

Her mother would force the young Kusama to spy on her father

during these extramarital liaisons.

Her puritanical mother's enraged reaction

instilled a terror of sex

that Kusama would spend a lifetime trying to overcome.

The polka dots that would come to define her work were

her way of distancing herself from these traumas.

The repetitive patterns would break down her sense of self.

Her desire for obliteration was born.

Despite her mother's disapproval, art became Kusama's only outlet

for her intense anxieties during her school years.

Her high school friends remember the young artist

during this formative time.

After finishing high school, Kusama defied her parents,

turning her back on the family business

and leaving home to attend art school in Kyoto.

The conservative style taught at the school

stifled Kusama's artistic instincts.

In her 1948 painting Onions, the vegetables are represented

with formal precision,

but the warped, chequered table cloth suggest a growing rebellion

against the restraints of the traditional Kyoto art world.

Dispirited by her experience at art school,

Kusama retreated to the family home

where she began to explore different styles of painting.

This was the austere post-war period and with materials scarce,

Kusama had to improvise her own canvases

out of discarded seed sacks.

When she was 22, Kusama created a mysterious

and dark painting titled Inside The Forest.

She scratched the surface of the paint with a nail.

A pattern of compulsive behaviour

that would become familiar in later work.

Kusama was searching for a style of her own

and a place in which she could develop it.

In 1957, she broke free from the stifling claustrophobia

of her disapproving mother and the restrictive Japanese art world.

She was determined to break away from the people

and expectations that were holding her back.

Her brother recalled her dramatic preparations to leave.

For Kusama, there was only one place in the world

where she could possibly fulfil her artistic ambitions...

New York City.

In the late 1950s, New York was overtaking Paris

as the centre of the artistic world.

Anything was possible in this increasingly permissive city.

Its confidence and creativity reflected Kusama's own.

But these early years in New York were not easy.

Winters in her unheated apartment were often so cold

she stayed up all night painting.

Sometimes she couldn't even afford to eat.

Kusama was not disheartened.

She felt she was on the verge of something great.

She often took the elevator to the top of the Empire State Building

to gaze at her adopted city.

Kusama wrote, "Looking down from the world's greatest skyscraper

"I felt I was standing at the threshold of all worldly ambition

"where truly anything was possible.

"My hands are empty now, but I'll fill them

"with everything my heart desires right here in New York.

"Such longing was like a roaring fire inside me.

"My commitment to a revolution in art caused the blood to run hot

"in my veins and even made me forget my hunger."

Photographer Lock Huey knew Kusama in these New York early years.

You know, she would seek out certain people

to have a photo with.

But, you know, it was OK with me, I didn't mind doing it.

I just said, "OK, sure."

But she was playing the whole thing of being from Japan

and she wanted to wear a costume, you know?

This is more like a costume.

Kusama's feverish self-promotion was matched

by the energy of her artistic experimentation.

Two years after her arrival in New York, she made a breakthrough

with a series of abstract paintings called Infinity Net.

These huge canvases, sometimes nearly ten meters long,

were filled with endlessly repeated lace-like loops of paint.

Obsessive, expansive, spectral.

The Infinity Nets represented a personal breakthrough.

Kusama had discovered the style that would announce her to the world.

Her work chimed with the Abstract Expressionism of the late 1950s.

Kusama was a leading light in New York's avant-garde scene,

with her paintings exhibited alongside work by Andy Warhol,

her barometer of success.

Four decades later, the Infinity Net paintings fetch colossal prices

on the international art market helping make Yayoi Kusama

one of the world's best-selling living artists.

-AUCTIONEER:

-3,700,000. 3.7 million again to Jean Paul.

Kusama's being visited by Glenn Scott Wright

of London's Victoria Miro Gallery,

the international agents for her work.

Hello, very nice to see you.

Kusama's work is in demand

and Wright has come armed with a shopping list.

We have some requests for pumpkins and for dogs.

Because last summer we showed pumpkins and dogs,

but we sold all of them.

So, we have more people who want them.

They have been asking us, "Can you get us any pumpkins or any dogs?"

Sure. I mean, I think a modest increase is fine.

I wouldn't make the increase too aggressive, but, you know...

A few months after the meeting, the requested pumpkin sculptures

proved as in demand as ever at the International Art Fair in Paris.

Oh, we are big collectors of Kusama.

We have...I don't know how many. I think eight or nine.

And I think she is one of the most important living artists

of our time.

Obviously, the dot paintings, that's what makes her famous.

But I think these sculptures here, they are so special

and we'll probably go for it.

So, I just put the reserve on it.

We will have to decide until tomorrow.

But I'm almost decided.

Now, I need the OK of my wife.

But she is also very, very much in favour of it.

Everybody is gearing up for the Tate, right?

-Buying before the Tate show.

-But that's why you should.

The price will be more and they're unique pieces,

so they won't be available.

This is the gamble that I like to take.

It isn't about investment or not, but because I'm not 100% sure

and if I come back tomorrow, it could be that someone before me

was there then I've lost my chance, but life goes on.

Kusama makes art that makes money.

She sees no contradiction between artistic vision

and business enterprise.

One of her most recent ventures was a collaboration

with luxury goods brand Louis Vuitton.

Kusama doesn't just lend her trademark polka dots

to international brands.

She's literally the face of the latest sales campaign.

We thought it would be really nice to have her

in every major city for people to walk past

and for it to kind of stop them.

A few months later a life-size Kusama mannequin was unwrapped

at Louis Vuitton's flagship store on New York's 5th Avenue.

Meanwhile, the real Kusama was also in New York

to launch her latest commercial collaboration

and spread the polka dot love

to Manhattan's upmarket handbag and shoe collectors.

And what do you think about the meaning

of this collection to the people?

Yes, we would love to.

But back at her hotel, the exertions of the day

had caught up with Kusama.

Meanwhile, across town,

a gala dinner was being held in Kusama's honour.

200 guests drawn from the city's glittering art world

had gathered to celebrate their lost daughter.

By 7pm, the speeches were under way,

but only a polka dot handbag occupied the seat reserved

for the guest of honour.

She has used her life to touch people's hearts.

She has protected herself and sacrificed herself for art.

We are blessed that she is in our home.

Thank you and bon appetite.

While the New York art world may now have adopted Kusama

as one of their own, her experience in the city five decades ago

was one of almost constant struggle.

She may have achieved recognition amongst fellow artists

for her Infinity Net paintings, but she was still up against

an almost exclusively male establishment.

Hi. Come on in. Good afternoon.

Come on in. This way.

Gallery owner Gertrude Stein

staged some of Kusama's earliest New York shows

and was well aware of the challenges she faced.

It was very hard for women to get there, very hard at that point.

And she knew it. And she knew she had to be extra strong,

extra smart and extra talented, which she was.

She really was.

By the early '60s, Kusama's frenetic experimentation

had led her away from painting and towards sculpture.

But it was a strange and unsettling kind of sculpture.

Kusama covered salvaged furniture with white, phallic objects.

Multiplying, writhing and only semi-erect,

these so-called 'soft sculptures'

were parodies of masculinity,

perhaps an expression of her distaste

for her father's promiscuity.

In 1963, she created probably her most famous 'soft-sculpture'

for exhibition at Gertrude Stein's gallery.

The centrepiece of the installation was a rowing boat

covered with phalluses made of soft furnishings.

On the surrounding walls were 999 photos of the 'penis-boat'.

To complete the piece, Kusama had herself photographed naked

in the middle of this display of overbearing machismo.

She had this idea for some time before she did it.

It was some kind of dream of hers to do a big piece, yeah.

A one piece show.

What did I think about it?

I thought it was a very important statement to make.

And this was what was called 'The Penis Boat'.

Not in a bad sense,

but they were not afraid of expressing sexual themes.

And nobody else was doing that.

I mean homosexuality was impossible,

everything was impossible about sexuality.

It was clearing out the air.

That's what she was trying to do. Just another playing field.

As the '60s progressed, Kusama became increasingly associated

with the sexual liberation

and radical politics of the hippy counterculture.

At a series of 'naked happenings' staged at key New York landmarks,

Kusama daubed her followers bodies with brightly-coloured polka dots.

Kusama's colourful gatherings were a continuation of her desire

for self-obliteration that had haunted her since childhood.

Speaking later,

she described the idea behind these performance art pieces.

"I played the role of high priestess.

"To get baptized at the Church of Self-Obliteration

"people first have their bodies painted all over with polka dots.

"Painting bodies with the patterns of my hallucinations

"obliterated their individual selves

"and returned them to the infinite universe.

"This is magic."

But despite Kusama's calculated provocations,

she remained fully-clothed, dancing awkwardly on the sidelines.

These anti-war, free love events

were also a way of overcoming the childhood trauma

of her father's affairs.

Her art was, once again, a form of therapy.

But her constant self-promotion and shock tactics

began to alienated her former supporters

in the New York art world.

Her work had been overshadowed by the publicity stunts

intended to promote it.

The critics turned against her,

a devastating development for the fragile Kusama.

In 1973, broke, depressed and lonely, she returned to Japan.

But Kusama's homecoming was to be more traumatic than anything

she had experienced in America.

She attempted to stage a happening, which was greeted with shock.

The conservative, post-war Japanese public were not as receptive

to free love and public nudity.

The Japanese press attacked her.

Exhausted and humiliated,

she found the jeering headlines too much to bear.

Kusama checked herself into Seiwa Hospital For The Mentally Ill

in 1975 when she was 46 years old.

Apart from a few short forays abroad, she's lived here ever since.

Up until the late '90s, Kusama had her own studio

within the hospital where she would spend her days

creating the abstract works that would be exhibited across the world.

Kusama now works in a purpose-built 5-storey studio

just around the corner from the hospital.

Her art remains the only outlet for the fears and obsessions

that continue to plague her.

Today, Yayoi Kusama is expecting a special visitor,

her new psychiatrist, Dr Matsunami.

THEY SPEAK JAPANESE

For nearly 40 years, the psychiatric hospital has offered Kusama

a respite from the mental anguish

that has plagued her since childhood.

Kusama worked on her 100 Canvas Series

for the Tate Modern exhibition for many months.

It was a mammoth project,

seeing Kusama producing one painting a day.

This would be her 90th canvas.

But Kusama didn't show up the next day, or the day after.

Finally, on the third day, word arrived from the clinic.

HE SPEAKS IN JAPANESE

Up until now, Kusama had always seemed to welcome

the presence of the camera.

Suddenly, it seemed to break her concentration.

Finally, Kusama seemed able to act.

This was the first time Kusama had painted over any of her work

in the whole of the year-and-a-half long project.

Kusama still wasn't satisfied with the piece.

She returned to the canvas many more times,

mulling over how to complete the work.

Finally, Kusama felt happy with the painting.

In February 2012,

a major retrospective of Kusama's work,

with the complete 100 Canvas Series at its centre,

opened at Tate Modern on London's South Bank.

Kusama travelled from Japan to attend the opening.

Hello, hey.

I'm so thrilled to see you!

So, this is the press of London.

Yeah.

And then we think this is the most beautiful room

of your Infinity Net paintings from the late '50s and early '60s.

I couldn't imagine I'd get to be at this room, you know?

No. Everything is going to work wonderfully.

-Everything is wonderful.

-Yeah.

And there's a piece here that you will not have seen for many years...

-Yeah.

-..in this room.

-Would you like to see it?

-I want to see it.

She never gets old.

For me, Kusama's work is always of its age

and it's always a young artist's work of its age

and I think that's extraordinary.

To coincide with the retrospective at Tate Modern,

the Victoria Miro Gallery staged a sale of some of Kusama's new work.

Oh, I love this new art! This new art is so much fun.

I bought this one. Magic carpets or something, you know?

Isn't it wonderful?

Kusama has never been more famous, more popular, more bankable.

For the elderly artist,

it's a vindication of her lifelong struggle.

It has been a long day.

Kusama is back at her hotel.

The excitement of the exhibition is a far cry from her daily life.

Despite the exhibition's success,

Kusama's demons are never very far away.

In spite of her fragility,

Kusama is more popular than ever both internationally

and back home in Japan.

While most 85-year-olds might be thinking of winding down,

that's the last thing on Kusama's mind.

Her work continues to intrigue audiences,

providing a glimpse into her eye-popping world.

Kusama's been honoured in cities and town across the country.

The town of Towada has created a sculpture park

for her enigmatic creations.

Kusama's polka dot universe can still inspire party goers today.

The ladies take to the floor,

replete with Kusama's trademark hair to celebrate their native daughter.

In Tokyo, building is under way on a new museum

designed to house Kusama's work.

Finally, she'll have a permanent home

for a lifetime of artistic creations.

For Kusama, work isn't a choice. It's a compulsion.

Her art is a strange alchemy,

transforming fears and anxieties

into something vibrant and beautiful.

Kusama's work has been a means of survival

in a world that has both rejected and embraced her.

Yayoi Kusama's compulsive need to create

has taken her from rural Japan

to New York's abstract scene in the 1960s

and on to the contemporary art world of Tokyo.

Her trademark polka dots and phallic soft sculptures

offer a vibrant glimpse into a troubled mind.

Kusama's work is a triumphant, colourful act of defiance,

creating beauty from fear

and guaranteeing her place in the history of contemporary art.