Yayoi Kusama

IMAGINE WALKING INTO A COMPLETELY WHITE ROOM. The kitchen counter, the sofa, and even the TV and the kettle on the hob are white. No, you have not just stepped into a mental hospital; it is the Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama's interactive installation The Obliteration Room. And how is it interactive? Well, in your hand is a set of stickers, each one a brightly coloured dot of a different size and Kusama wants you to stick these little guys anywhere and everywhere!
For Kusama, these dots are a way of understanding the universe. In her words: 'Our earth is only one polka dot among a million stars in the cosmos. Polka dots are a way to infinity.
When we obliterate nature and our bodies with polka dots, we become part of the unity of our environment.' This idea of
'obliteration' was first conceived in the 1960s, when she began covering herself and others entirely in dots for her 'self-obliteration' acts. In The Obliteration Room, Kusama invites you to participate, to collaborate not only with the artist, but also with each other, to transform - obliterate - the space into a blur of multicoloured dots. For her solo show at David Zwirner Gallery in New York in 2015, she recreated this installation inside a small prefabricated American suburban house constructed within the gallery space.
The experience is akin to another well-known piece by Kusama, the Infinity Mirror Room, where you enter alone into a contained space panelled wall to wall and floor to ceiling with mirrors. The flickering lights that hover within are reflected infinitely, leaving you feeling like you are floating in space and inviting you to lose yourself and take your place as but one star among millions.