Yayoi Kusama / Patterns & Form: Art History & Polka Dot Pumpkins

Yayoi Kusama Pumpkins

Watch the videos and provided information attached on following pages for this weeks lessons on Yayoi Kusama and answer the questions below:

• What do all of Yayoi Kusama’s artwork have in common?

• Why did she create her artwork and what do repeating patterns make her feel?

• What was a defining moment in Yayoi Kusama’s life that shaped her into an artist?

ACTIVITY #2

Recreate your own organic form Yayoi Kusama inspired pumpkin. Look at Kusama’s artwork on the following pages for references to get inspiration.

This can be:

• A drawing, sculpture, or painting

• Your own real pumpkin painted or carved in the style of Kusama.

• Zentangle/doodle pumpkin.

ACTIVITY #1

VIDEO#1 History of Yayoi Kusama VIDEO#2: Brief history on Yayoi Kusama and how to make pumpkins

Yayoi Kusama is sometimes called the Princess of Polka Dots. All of her artwork have one thing in common: she loves to paint polka dots and other patterns.

“A polka dot has the form of the sun, which is a symbol of the energy of the whole world and our living life, and also the form of the moon, which is calm. Round, soft, colorful, senseless and un-knowing. Polka dots can’t stay alone; like the communicative life of people, two or three polka dot’s become movement. Polka-dots are

a way to infinity” - Yayou Kusama

After moving to New York City in 1958, Yayoi started making paintings with repeated curved brush strokes of thick paint over a black or gray canvas. She calls these paintings “Infinity Net Series” and she still likes to make them. She says making them is a form of art therapy, because repeating the brushstrokes over and over makes her feel calm.

In 2014, one of her Infinity Net paintings, “White #28” painted in 1960 sold for $7,109,000.00 (seven million, one hundred nine thousand dollars) which is the highest price ever paid for a living female artist’s artwork.

Yayoi Kusama is one of the most important artists alive today. She is 91 years old.

Yayoi Kusama - Art history and Polka dot pumpkins

YAYOI KUSAMA PUMPKINS and PATTERNS

Yayoi loved to draw pumpkins when she was a little girl. In Japan pumpkins are called かぼちゃ kabocha. She said, "I love pumpkins because of their humorous form, warm feeling, and a human- like quality and form. My desire to create works of pumpkins still continues. I have enthusiasm as if I were still a child.”

The installation below is called “All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins”. People walk into a room filled with mirrors and pumpkins.

YAYOI KUSAMA PUMPKIN REFERENCES

Drawing Pumpkins Instructions

How to draw a Yayoi Kusama pumpkin

1. Using step by step drawing guide, break down and simply draw the steps demonstrated. You are encouraged to draw different shapes of pumpkins. This can be done on colored paper or white paper. Fill as much of the paper as possible.

2. Fill your pumpkin with dots to create an illusion of form. Note how Kusama uses sots and makes them smaller to bigger towards the middle . Permanent markers or sharpie can be used. Your dots do not have to be black.

3. The STEM...Note that Kusama’s stem in inverse, meaning, an apposite and opposing color. Her dot’s are white and negative space black.

4. Erase any pencil marks and cut your pumpkin out.

5. Background: chose a colored paper that complements or contrasts with

Yayoi Kusama

Sculpture Instructions:

Make a Play Doh or Model Magic pumpkin or dog. Let it dry and then then put dots on it with a marker or paint.