Experience Yayoi Kusama’s Profound Connection With Nature

Contemporary Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama is one of the most popular artists in the world, drawing millions to experience her immersive installations.

Yayoi Kusama and Her Eternal Love For Plants

Exclusively at New York Botanical Garden, Kusama reveals her lifelong fascination with the natural world, beginning with her childhood spent in the greenhouses and fields of her family’s seed nursery. Her artistic concepts of obliteration, infinity, and eternity are inspired by her intimate engagement with the colors, patterns, and life cycles of plants and flowers.

Spectacular Installations at the New York Botanical Garden

Spectacular installations feature Kusama’s multifaceted art, including monumental floral sculptures that transform NYBG’s 250-acre landmark landscape. Across the grounds, discover installations that include the artist’s legendary Narcissus Garden (1966/2021) in the Native Plant Garden. Nearby, marvel at Ascension of Polka Dots on the Trees (2002/2021), where soaring trees are adorned in vibrant red with white polka dots. The horticultural spectacle across the landscape changes throughout the seasons, with tulips and irises in spring, dahlias, and sunflowers in summer, and pumpkins and chrysanthemums in fall.

Plant-Inspired, Polka-Dotted Sculptures

In and around the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, Kusama’s work comes to life through a seasonal progression of violas, salvias, zinnias, chrysanthemums, and other colorful annuals, while her plant-inspired, polka-dotted sculptures are nestled among meadow grasses, bellflowers, and water lilies, including Hymn of Life—Tulips (2007) in the Conservatory Courtyard Hardy Pool. Her mesmerizing Pumpkins Screaming About Love Beyond Infinity (2017) is on view in the Visitor Center Gallery. In the LuEsther T. Mertz Library Building, explore paintings, biomorphic collages, sculpture, and works on paper inspired by Kusama’s deep knowledge of nature, and in the adjacent Ross Gallery, enjoy Walking Piece (1966/2021), a multiscreen digital projection of a performance work from the artist’s collection. New monumental sculptures Dancing Pumpkin (2020) and I Want to Fly to the Universe (2020) make their debut in the NYBG landscape. They join the artist’s first-ever obliteration greenhouse, Flower Obsession (2017/2021).

About Yayoi Kusama

One of the most critically acclaimed artists of our time, Yayoi Kusama has produced work throughout her career that expresses her fascination with the natural world and profound engagement with nature in a variety of mediums and formats. Her earliest sketches capture the bright blooms in the hot houses of her family’s nursery. In recent decades, her work has included mesmerizing installations, large-scale public sculptures of tulips and pumpkins, and prolific series of paintings referencing natural forms. Strong connections exist between this current work and the drawings and paintings of plants and landscapes the artist completed beginning in her teens. Yayoi Kusama's current exhibit is a beautiful blend of art and her love for all things plants and flowers. For tickets and more information about the exhibit, please visit the New York Botanical Garden website.