The zany playground that invites us to see the world from Kusama's unusual perspective
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The zany playground that invites us to see the world from Kusama's unusual perspective
This week: You, Me and the Balloons at Manchester International, Ralph Fiennes as Macbeth, a cultural podcast and a debut novel
SIXTY seconds. That’s how long you usually get to spend inside one of Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama’s Infinity Mirror Room works. A single trippy minute after queuing for anything from 15 minutes to several hours.
So what a treat then to spent over an hour at her latest exhibition and her largest ever immersive environment, You, Me and the Balloons, at Factory International in Manchester. From Sherlock Holmes-inspired murder mystery games to six-course tasting menus on decommissioned Tube carriages, it seems we’re surrounded by so-called ‘immersive experiences’ these days. But Kusama takes it to another level. Seeing yourself reflected back multiple times in her walls of mirrors you become part of her art. You melt into the work and experience something of the artist’s own unusual perception of the world - the hallucinations that cause her to feel as if she is 'dissolving’ into her surroundings. More than a minute in there and you might struggle to pull yourself all the way back out.
You, Me and the Balloons is both less and more intense than her Infinity Mirror Rooms - or rather it moves between both states. When you step inside the room of gigantic polka-dotted yellow and black tendrils that begins the exhibition, it is thrillingly overwhelming. The space - The Hope of the Polka Dots Buried in Infinity will Eternally Cover the Universe (2019) - is like a cell in a sci-fi comic strip, entangled with huge alien plant shoots or the tentacles of a terrifying space beast.
You, Me and the Balloons allows us a glimpse into Kusama’s unique perspective of the world that invites us to question our own.
At the top of a staircase you are rewarded with a view of the rest of the exhibition. It’s a zany playground of massive inflatables. A girl in a red and white polka dot dress (Yakoi-Chan) and a spotty dog (Toko-Ton) tower over the visitors, some of whom are taking a rest - or a selfie - next to a humungous yellow and black pumpkin. At first, it’s less overwhelming than that intensive minute in an Infinity Mirror Room. There’s a wider variety of objects to navigate the space by and many of them are recognisable shapes rather than a repeating abstract pattern.
But after about 10 minutes, after the impact of your initial encounter with the space has worn off and you’ve let yourself get comfortable - maybe even having a little lie-down on one of the inflatable Clouds (2023), you are suddenly again hit by how extraordinary it all is.
There are two Infinity Mirror Rooms of sorts in You, Me and the Balloons that together form the work Dots Obsession. One you can step inside and stand among red and white spotty balloons, reflected in the mirrors that line the walls (Balloon Dome with Mirror Room). It’s not as all-encompassing as some of her other works - Gleaming Lights of the Souls at Liverpool Biennial or those currently at Tate Modern, say - but that may have been because I was there with my kids and was worried about them touching things. The second (Peephole Dome) is really special - you peer into an eyehole to encounter a mind-warping scene. Words don’t do it justice but one of the children in our group described it as looking like ‘The Mushroom Kingdom from Mario’, which was not a bad assessment.
Contributing to the curious atmosphere is Kusama herself - on a giant screen above a forest of fluorescent pink, spotty tendrils, wearing a matching pink wig. Her singing in Japanese is hypnotic and strange - weirdly comforting until you learn it is her Song of a Manhattan Suicide Addict (2002). The piece shares its name with her debut novel from 1978, which fictionalises her time in New York. This she wrote after voluntarily moving into a psychiatric hospital in Tokyo, where she continues to live and work, overcoming the demands of her obsessive-compulsive disorder through artistic production.
The combined effect on Kusama’s mental health of an abusive mother and the experience of living in Japan while the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed thousands of her compatriots was profound. She has suffered dreadfully yet art has allowed her to retake control and embrace what makes her different. Spending time in You, Me and the Balloons allows us a glimpse into her unique perspective of the world that invites us to question our own.
Yakoi Kusama: You, Me and the Balloons is at Factory International in Aviva Studios, Manchester, until August 28. Standard tickets are £15, affordable tickets are £10 and £7.50. Book here.
We’re Also Buzzing About…
Ralph Fiennes as Macbeth: Booking a ticket for this certainly wasn’t pretty but after more than three hours of waiting in a queue that kept pausing only to eventually send me to a website with an incorrect link, that finally let me into the booking page, which kept crashing, freezing and emptying my basket, I got there. Surely with Fiennes and Indira Varma in the leading roles, it’s got to be worth the pain. At the time of typing, there are still some seats available for the Liverpool performances as well as those in Edinburgh, London and Washington DC if you fancy a theatre trip further afield.
Cultural Peeps Podcast: As a podcast addict always on the hunt for independent shows, I was pleased to spot this one mentioned in a tweet. I haven’t listened to any episodes yet - so I’ll be discovering it along with you - but am planning to start with the interview with illustrator Jonny Hannah, whose current exhibition Shipbuilders and Fisherfolk is at Hartlepool Museum until November 4.
The Bay by Julia Rampen: Full disclosure, Julia is a former colleague and (not former) friend of mine but I’m mostly excited about the release of her debut novel because of its location - the shifting sands of Morecambe Bay - and because I have always admired her writing. Find out more here.
Thanks for reading this week’s Stored Honey. As a few of you got in touch to say you had enjoyed the clue in last week’s edition then here is one for next week’s subject matter: It’s got terrible tusks and terrible jaws.
I’d love to hear what you think of this newsletter - and any suggestions for content. Get in touch on Twitter, in the comments or you by dropping me a line at tostoredhoney@gmail.com.
Have a great week,
Laura