Pumpkin Spicy Love

Aspiring to Pumpkin's Love
the Love in My Heart

SFMOMA

Ongoing – November 2

     Well, the Bay Area is breaking up with Yayoi Kusama. We will need to get over our Kusama crush. The last of her exhibits will be leaving SFMOMA after its 26-month display. We can’t give the sculpture a big hug before it goes, since it measures 18 feet x 11 feet. (Not that you should be touching it anyway!) Still, stop bye and blow a kiss. If you haven’t seen the work already, drive now, hop on BART, use an electric scooter, or heck thumb a ride, and see this magnificent piece before it takes off for parts unknown.

For Yayoi Kusama, pumpkins have been a lifelong source of fascination. As a child, she was drawn to them for their “generous unpretentiousness” and “spiritual balance.” They first appeared in her work in the 1940s and have been the subject of some of the most important works of her career. Today, polka-dotted pumpkins are synonymous with the artist and her idiosyncratic style.
     Kusama (96) made her first pumpkin 79 years ago in Japan. Aspiring to Pumpkin’s Love, the Love in My Heart is among her most recent sculptures. In this massive sculpture, the polka dots represent self-obliteration — not in a destructive sense – rather, as a means of merging the individual with the larger universe. As you navigate the sculpture’s impressive five-stem form and undulating walls, you are invited to share in the artist’s admiration for this symbol which embodies peace and joy.

Kusama, and what I believe is first pumpkin, sculpted in 1946.

However, this photo is taken many years later.

For more information on Pumpkin Love, click here.