Kusama: Infinity

Although Yayoi Kusama was an artist I knew about, I didn't know much about her background and her legacy. Lenz did an amazing job of weaving the cultural history, the political backdrop of the time Kusama was trying to pave her way as an artist with such grace and curiosity while portraying the present day Kusama with such compassionate humanity. I was mesmerized. Needless to say this film offers a tremendous value culturally and historically. It should be a required film to watch, especially for art history students!

I wish I saw this 2018 documentary before I saw Yayoi Kusama's wondrously expansive exhibit at the New York Botanical Garden last year because it would've given me a deeper appreciation of the genesis of her art and how she views the enveloping scope of nature, something she realized she shared with Georgia O'Keefe. As seen through her unique eye-popping pieces, Kusama's colorful expressiveness is meticulously hypnotic, and filmmaker Heather Lenz does a remarkably thorough job tracking the now-93-year-old artist's relentless tenacity in light of the racism and sexism she faced over the decades in getting her art seen.

An infinitely amazing, thoughtful, compassionate and deeply profound look at one of the most influential and unsung artists of the modern era. Director Heather Lenz captures the eccentric essence of this fascinating figure, while also making a bigger statement about overlooked female artists and artists of color. It creates a compelling and shocking case for how Kusama's vision influenced greats like Warhol, but how she got none of the credit. The exclusive footage Lenz caught of Kusama is amazing and rare. This film demands to be seen because Kusama demands to be known.

A remarkable, provocative, innovative artist in canvas, art installations, and even performance art protests. Decades ahead of her time, she fought hard her whole life against the establishment but found her ideas constantly stolen and capitalized on by men. Even when hospitalized for her obsessive compulsions, she was nonetheless prolifically productive. Her mirrored rooms and penis-covered furniture are the perfect fodder for social media, and she finally got the recognition she deserved when almost 60 - her works and installations now garner millions.

This documentary is well researched and illustrated by contemporary footage.

Heather Lenz directs an important, timely, and fascinating film about the now 89-year-old artist, Yayoi Kusama. A Japanese who in the early 1960s escaped her stifling family to begin her career in New York, where she innovated--as Lenz's film reveals--only to have her concepts and techniques stolen by the likes of Warhol, Oldenburg, et al. These men soon eclipsed her celebrity, and at her expense. Very critical correction of the historical record. Lenz also locates the origins of some of Kusama's visual motifs in childhood trauma, which had resulted in hallucinations and then obsession with hallucinated shapes and patterns. Kusama herself acknowledges as much and credits art-making with her survival. Her mirrored "infinity room" installations, giant polka-dotted pumpkins, and huge paintings covered obsessively with her personal iconography, now draw huge crowds at museums and galleries all over the world. Heather Lenz has not only drawn a powerful portrait of an artist whose late fame has intense cultural significance, but has also set a humanistic standard for the accounting of biographical details and, critically, for setting the historical record straight.