PRINTPROVENACE:
Victoria Miro Gallery, London
Private collection, Asia
Victoria Miro Gallery, London
Private collection, Asia
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Key-Chan
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2008 FRP, paint (unique) 130(L) x 56(W) x 100(H) cm Signed Yayoi Kusama and titled KEY-CHAN in English, and dated 2008 |
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Estimate
4,400,000 - 5,500,000 1,140,000 - 1,425,000 146,100 - 182,700
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Sold Price
10,200,000 2,656,250 339,773
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Inquiry
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Catalogue Note:
Born in a rural area near Matsumoto, Japan in 1929, Yayoi Kusama suffered from hallucinations as a child; every day was a neverending struggle with misery and fear. Through constant painting, Kusuma was able to find a release for the unease that plagued her; art provided a means of coping with her mental illness, and gave her a reason to go on living. In 1957, Kusuma traveled to New York (which at that time was home to the most exciting, but also the most competitive, art scene in the world), where she became a leading member of the avant garde.
Kusama has a partiality for dots due to her hallucinatory visions. She covers the surfaces of all kinds of materials - walls, floors, canvases, objects, human bodies, and even herself - in dots. And by expanding dots into infinity through repeated lines, her work confounds the existence of real space, bringing the viewers into unconscious states of dizziness, not knowing whether they are in reality or illusions. Her diverse creative mediums and themes are beloved by many, including multitudes of museums and private collectors. Her work moreover once set an auction record of 5 million US dollars, highest of all living female artists. This large pumpkin artwork is a 2-dimensional, partially 3-dimensional piece. The artist engages in continuous dialog with her inner self through the use of this adored and treasured theme, and through these soliloquies finds both a sense of belonging and an exit for her tortured soul. Kusama Yayoi incorporates her experiences of hallucination into her work, thereby relieving stress through the creation of stunning, aweinspiring art. She explains, This is how I let the shock and fear I am almost succumbed by settle and abate; these experiences are why I started painting.
After 1990, Yayoi Kusama created outdoor sculptures and decorative pieces for museums, art festivals, and exhibitions. Among these works, celebrated pieces include pumpkin sculptures and the post-millennium “Hi, Konnichiwa (Hello) series” featuring sculptures of large-scale plants, flowers, girls, and puppies. The surface of each work is covered with “polka dots” in bright colors in a very strong style. This piece, Polka Dot Puppy, is one of the sculpture works included in the 2009 Victoria Miro Gallery Garden Sculpture Exhibition in London. There was a pair of puppy sculptures of which the taller one is called Key-Chan and the smaller one Rhu-Chan. Chan refers to “small” or “dear” in Japanese. Yayoi Kusama is truly a child at heart, which is why she named her puppy sculptures with cute nicknames such as Key-Chan and Rhu-Chan. There are different colors in the “Polka Dot Puppy” series, and as their names imply, each puppy sculpture is unique.
Kusama has a partiality for dots due to her hallucinatory visions. She covers the surfaces of all kinds of materials - walls, floors, canvases, objects, human bodies, and even herself - in dots. And by expanding dots into infinity through repeated lines, her work confounds the existence of real space, bringing the viewers into unconscious states of dizziness, not knowing whether they are in reality or illusions. Her diverse creative mediums and themes are beloved by many, including multitudes of museums and private collectors. Her work moreover once set an auction record of 5 million US dollars, highest of all living female artists. This large pumpkin artwork is a 2-dimensional, partially 3-dimensional piece. The artist engages in continuous dialog with her inner self through the use of this adored and treasured theme, and through these soliloquies finds both a sense of belonging and an exit for her tortured soul. Kusama Yayoi incorporates her experiences of hallucination into her work, thereby relieving stress through the creation of stunning, aweinspiring art. She explains, This is how I let the shock and fear I am almost succumbed by settle and abate; these experiences are why I started painting.
After 1990, Yayoi Kusama created outdoor sculptures and decorative pieces for museums, art festivals, and exhibitions. Among these works, celebrated pieces include pumpkin sculptures and the post-millennium “Hi, Konnichiwa (Hello) series” featuring sculptures of large-scale plants, flowers, girls, and puppies. The surface of each work is covered with “polka dots” in bright colors in a very strong style. This piece, Polka Dot Puppy, is one of the sculpture works included in the 2009 Victoria Miro Gallery Garden Sculpture Exhibition in London. There was a pair of puppy sculptures of which the taller one is called Key-Chan and the smaller one Rhu-Chan. Chan refers to “small” or “dear” in Japanese. Yayoi Kusama is truly a child at heart, which is why she named her puppy sculptures with cute nicknames such as Key-Chan and Rhu-Chan. There are different colors in the “Polka Dot Puppy” series, and as their names imply, each puppy sculpture is unique.