Yayoi Kusama: Obliteration Room

at David Zwirner Gallery

By Emily Malan Photography

May 13^th, 2015

exhibition

Stopped by to see the Yayoi Kusama Give me Love exhibition in Chelsea at the David Zwirner gallery. I was particularly interested in viewing and interacting with the Obliteration Room. A new friend had mentioned it while at a birthday party last weekend. This installation was first exhibited at the Queensland Gallery in Australia as an interactive children’s art project in 2002. This is the first time it was ever shown in the United States. The room is situated inside an American suburban home, American flag and patio furniture. The room is white at first, with no polka dots.
The viewer is given stickers from the gallery and are welcomed to place stickers around the white washed walls and objects. Kusama uses the polka dot motif frequently in her art. She describes one hallucination about dots covering her body, which makes the correlation of her experiences to the piece very personal.