Infinity Mirror Rooms by Yayoi Kusama

In 1965 Yayoi Kusama had a breakthrough when producing Infinity Mirror Room – Phalli’s Field. Using mirrors, she transformed the intense repetition of her paintings and works on paper into a perceptual experience.

The Japanese artist and writer works in a variety of media including painting, collage, soft sculpture, performance art and environmental installations, most of which exhibit her interest in psychedelic colors, repetition and pattern.

Over the course of Kusama’s career, she produced more than 20 distinct Infinity Mirror Rooms. In the complex infinity mirror installations, purpose-built rooms lined with mirrored glass contain scores of neon-colored balls, hanging at various heights above the viewer. Viewers stand inside on a small platform seeing the light repeatedly reflect off the mirrored surfaces creating the illusion of a never-ending space.

This year, a 65-year retrospective of her work opened at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C. The exhibit presents six infinity mirror rooms, the most ever shown together. Ranging from peep-show-like chambers to multimedia installations, each of the kaleidoscopic environments offer a chance to step into an illusion of infinite space. The room provides an opportunity to examine the artist’s central themes like the celebration of life and its aftermath. The celebration of her work promises to be one of 2017’s essential art experiences.

Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirrors travels to five museums in the United States and Canada and is on view at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden until May 14; the Seattle Art Museum June 30–Sept. 10; The Broad, Los Angeles, Oct. 21, 2017–Jan 10, 2018; Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, March 3–May 27, 2018; Cleveland Museum of Art, July 9–Sept. 30, 2018; and the High Museum of Art Atlanta, Nov. 18, 2018–Feb. 17, 2019.