Yayoi Kusama
Has painted, written and built out of dots and nets since the 1950s, and lives by choice in a psychiatric hospital.
Yayoi Kusama was born at Matsumoto in 1929 and has experienced hallucinations of proliferating dots and nets since childhood; the work is a direct account of them. She wrote to Georgia O'Keeffe for advice, moved to New York in 1958, made the Infinity Net paintings, the soft phallic Accumulation sculptures, mirrored rooms and a series of public nude happenings, then returned to Japan in 1973 and has lived voluntarily in a psychiatric hospital in Tokyo since 1977, working daily in a studio opposite. Her international reassessment began with the Venice Biennale in 1993 and has not stopped since.
This is one of the most forged markets in contemporary art, and the Yayoi Kusama Studio in Tokyo is the only body that issues certificates; a work without one is very difficult to sell and should be treated with caution. The Infinity Net paintings and the 1960s Accumulations lead. Pumpkin sculptures exist in many editions and sizes, and identifying which is essential. There is a very large output of prints, editioned objects and licensed product, and the last of these is routinely offered as limited-edition work.
If you own a work by Yayoi Kusama
Send photographs and whatever paperwork came with it. The first question is what the work actually is — edition or unique, when, and in what condition — because everything else follows from the answer. A valuation costs nothing and commits you to nothing.
Write to info@whitebankfineart.co.uk, or start below.
Whitebank Fine Art is an art advisory and gallery, not an auction house, and is not affiliated with any auction house or with the artist, their estate or their representatives. This page describes the range we advise on. Nothing here is investment advice.