I loved everything about Yayoi Kusama's current exhibit, Cosmic Nature, now through the end of October 2021 at New York Botanical Gardens. My very favorite exhibit was Ascension of Polka Dots on the Trees (see last post) but a very close second was this one, Narcissus Garden. Kusama first staged this in 1966, and it was her very first outdoor art installation. The reflective orbs form new patterns and shapes with natural shifts of wind and water, and they offer new, ephemeral reflections with the passage of time.
In Kusama's own words,
"The ceaseless movement of the water pushed the globes together and pulled them apart with gentle clicks and squeaks, constantly transforming the shape of the work. It was a startling but dazzling sight; a mysterious sort of entity reproducing endlessly at the water's edge."
Indeed! I loved it.
