Confidential Art Report Christopher Shake Artist: Yayoi Kusama CTS Arts Consultancy 2020-April-17 [email protected] The Yellow Report Yayoi Kusama By: Christopher Shake Enquires CTS Arts Consultancy Limited +44 7472 572 871 (UK) 103 Farringdon Road +1 646 480 0654 (US) London [email protected] christophershake.com Copyright © 2020 Christopher Shake Confidential Art Report Christopher Shake Artist: Yayoi Kusama CTS Arts Consultancy 2020-April-17 [email protected] KEY FACTS: MUSEUMS: MOMA, Whitney Museum of American Art, Guggenheim, Yayoi Kusama TATE (more than 50 Museums world-wide) Japanese b. 1929 SELECTED AWARDS: Age: 91 2000 Asahi Price, Tokyo, Japan 2003 Odre des Arts et des Lettes, Paris, France Kusama is the highest 2006 Praemium Imperiale, Tokyo, Japan selling living female artist in the world CAREER MILESTONES: (Forbes). 1965 – Creates first Infinity Room to massive acclaim in art market Professional artists since 1993 - 45th Venice Biennale 1955 (65 years in the art 2015 – Global retrospective attracts largest global market) audience for an art exhibition, Most Acclaimed Series of RECORD SALES: Works – Infinity Nets, In November 2014, a white infinity net painting from 1960 Pumpkin paintings and sold for a new world record of $7.1 million sculptures, and Infinity Rooms REPORT OVERVIEW It is important to remember that Yayoi Kusama is the MENTAL HEALTH: highest selling living female artist in the world. In recent Ever since 1977, Kusama years Kusama has been labelled by many critics and has been living in a dealers as the most popular artist in the world. The artist psychiatric hospital in has been successful in drawing millions of visitors to Tokyo, going to her experience her immersive installation light boxes studio across the street where Kusama is credited for being the prime innovator of during the day and the immersive art environment with her infinity structures painting eight hours a dating back to 1965 (‘nfinity Mirror Room) which brought day. Her works have long her fame and recognition within a white male dominated been an outlet for her to New York City art market of the times. Now, at 91 years of both cope with and age, living back in her native Japan, Kusama is still painting express ideas around or making art every single day, eight hours a day, just as metal health issues. she has for the most of her life. Her career spans paintings, performances, room-size presentations, outdoor sculptural CULTURAL INFLUENCE: installations, literary works, films, fashion, design, and Film: Kusama Infinity interventions within existing architectural structures, Book: Infinity Net which allude at once to microscopic and macroscopic universes. Enquires CTS Arts Consultancy Limited +44 7472 572 871 (UK) 103 Farringdon Road +1 646 480 0654 (US) London [email protected] christophershake.com Copyright © 2020 Christopher Shake Confidential Art Report Christopher Shake Artist: Yayoi Kusama CTS Arts Consultancy 2020-April-17 [email protected] HISTORY Though Kusama is a Japanese artist, she left Japan at the age of 29, after being prompted by Georgia O'Keeffe (the late O’Keefe held at one time the auction record for the highest selling female artist at USD 44.4 M for ), legendary American female artists of the time, to pack her things and move to NYC to pursue her career as an artist - here she not only met O’Keefe but also artists such as Andy Warhol, Donald Judd, Claes Oldenburg and the famous abstract expressionist's of the time - all NYC artists of the era in the rich soil of the New York Art market. Georgia O’Keefe and Yayoi Kusama – Kusama’s early influence As a child, Kusama suffered from hallucinations. Her entire field of vision would become overwhelmed by a proliferation of flowers, dots, or nets. Her installations and repetitive Nets and Dots were recreations of this sense of self-obliteration—a source of fear and trauma—executed in a celebratory, positive way. Mental health is now and has always been a central theme in Kusama’s life work. She has been living in a mental asylum in Tokyo since 1977 and has been open about her mental illness for most of her career. She attributes to her talent to "staking her life" on every piece of work she makes. She began painting repetitive dots and patterns (Infinity works) as an outlet for her obsessive compulsions and hallucinatory episodes where she later got the ideas for infinity rooms which are now some of the most glorified and precious works in the entire art market. Below is taken from an article in a Christie’s newsletter on Kusama: It is impossible to separate the art of Yayoi Kusama from her mental health. She describes her work as ‘art medicine’. The ‘Infinity Net’ paintings, which first won her critical acclaim in New York, originate from visual hallucinations that she claims have haunted her since childhood. She first referenced the hallucinatory episodes as early as 1963, in an interview with the art critic Gordon Brown for WABC radio. ‘My nets grew beyond myself and beyond the canvases I was covering with them,’ she said. ‘They began to cover the walls, the ceiling, and finally the whole universe’. She now lives voluntarily in a psychiatric asylum in Tokyo, which has been her home since 1977. Donald Judd worked as an art critic before becoming a leading light in the Minimalist movement. ‘The effect is both complex and simple,’ he wrote of Kusama’s paintings in Art News in 1959. The ‘Infinity Net paintings would fetch around $200 a piece at that time; now they sell for many millions. Kusama's recent retrospective, Infinitie Obesession attracted the largest global audience for an art exhibition, during its world tour in 2015. Enquires CTS Arts Consultancy Limited +44 7472 572 871 (UK) 103 Farringdon Road +1 646 480 0654 (US) London [email protected] christophershake.com Copyright © 2020 Christopher Shake Confidential Art Report Christopher Shake Artist: Yayoi Kusama CTS Arts Consultancy 2020-April-17 [email protected] 5 YEAR AUCTION PERFORMACE – SMALL PUMPKIN PAINTINGS IN USD 5YR Price Performace in Kusama Auction Market (Pumpkin Paintings in USD) 450000 400000 350000 300000 250000 200000 150000 100000 50000 0 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 3 YEAR AUCTION SALES – PUMPKIN PAINTINGS IN USD RECORDS IN 2018 FOR YAYOI KUSAMA SMALL PUMPKIN PAINTINGS acrylic on Height 5.5 in.; Width 7.1 in. / Height 14 cm.; Est-Ouest Auctions Co., Ltd.: Sunday, November PUMPKIN canvas 1992 Width 18 cm. Signed, Inscribed 25, 2018 [Lot 00514] 2018 127,808 - 191,712 $ 170,113.00 acrylic on Height 6.2 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.8 cm.; Mainichi Auction: Saturday, April 21, 2018 [Lot Pumpkin canvas 1995 Width 22.7 cm. 00201] Paintings, Prints and Sculpture 2018 139,324 - 185,765 $ 208,986.00 acrylic on Height 6.2 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.8 cm.; K Auction: Wednesday, November 21, 2018 [Lot Pumpkin canvas 1991 Width 22.7 cm. 00114] Modern and Contemporary Art 2018 221,631 - 310,283 $ 247,872.00 acrylic on Height 6.2 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.8 cm.; K Auction: Wednesday, September 19, 2018 [Lot Pumpkin canvas 1993 Width 22.7 cm. 00117] Modern and Contemporary Art 2018 196,302 - 312,299 $ 249,482.00 acrylic on Height 6.2 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.8 cm.; Seoul Auction: Sunday, May 27, 2018 [Lot 00036] Pumpkin canvas 1992 Width 22.7 cm. 25th Hong Kong Sale 2018 254,942 - 382,414 $ 254,942.00 Acrylic on Height 6.2 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.8 cm.; Pumpkin canvas 1990 Width 22.7 cm. Signed, Inscribed Ravenel: Sunday, December 2, 2018 [Lot 00221] 2018 356,353 - 453,541 $ 388,749.00 RECORDS IN 2019 – FEB 2020 FOR YAYOI KUSMAM SMALL PUMPKIN PAINTINGS acrylic on Height 6.2 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.8 cm.; Mainichi Auction: Saturday, July 13, 2019 [Lot Pumpkin canvas 1993 Width 22.7 cm. 00239] SALE 612 Paintings, Prints and Sculpture 2019 111,202 - 148,269 $ 185,337.00 acrylic on Height 6.2 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.8 cm.; K Auction: Wednesday, March 20, 2019 [Lot Pumpkin canvas 1992 Width 22.7 cm. 00110] Modern and Contemporary Art 2019 212,557 - 309,979 $ 247,629.00 acrylic on Height 6.2 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.8 cm.; K Auction: Wednesday, July 17, 2019 [Lot 00104] Pumpkin canvas 1990 Width 22.7 cm. Modern and Contemporary Art 2019 220,187 - 296,406 $ 256,518.00 acrylic on Height 5.5 in.; Width 7.1 in. / Height 14 cm.; Sotheby's Hong Kong: Monday, October 7, 2019 PUMPKIN canvas 1991 Width 18 cm. [Lot 00543] Contemporary Art 2019 76,496 - 101,995 $ 302,798.00 acrylic on Height 6.3 in.; Width 9 in. / Height 15.9 cm.; Sotheby's New York: Friday, November 15, 2019 PUMPKIN canvas 1995 Width 22.9 cm. [Lot 00480] Contemporary Art Day Auction 2019 150,000 - 200,000 $ 325,000.00 Christie's London: Thursday, February 13, 2020 acrylic on Height 6.1 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.5 cm.; [Lot 00133] Post-War and Contemporary Art Day Pumpkin canvas 1995 Width 22.5 cm. Sale 2020 156,617 - 195,771 $ 261,028.00 acrylic on Height 6.2 in.; Width 8.9 in. / Height 15.8 cm.; Mainichi Auction: Saturday, January 25, 2020 [Lot Pumpkin canvas 1990 Width 22.7 cm. 00263] SALE 629 Paintings, Prints and Sculpture 2020 109,796 - 155,544 $ 265,340.00 Enquires CTS Arts Consultancy Limited +44 7472 572 871 (UK) 103 Farringdon Road +1 646 480 0654 (US) London [email protected] christophershake.com Copyright © 2020 Christopher Shake Confidential Art Report Christopher Shake Artist: Yayoi Kusama CTS Arts Consultancy 2020-April-17 [email protected] 2017 – 2020 AUCTION PERFORMACE –MEDIUM TO LARGE NETS PAINTINGS IN USD Yayoi Kusama - Recent Medium to Large Nets Painting Sales (USD) $9,000,000 $8,000,000 $7,000,000 $6,000,000 $5,000,000 $4,000,000 $3,000,000 $2,000,000 $1,000,000 $- 2017 2018 2019 2020 RECORDS IN 2018 FOR YAYOI MEDIUM TO LARGE NETS PAINTINGS acrylic on Height 63.8 in.; Width 51.3 in.