Contemporary art is meant to allow us to reflect on society and the issues that we face as an individual and the world around us. In the Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away by Yayoi Kusama the viewers have described as being entranced. This room is a paradox. This is due to the nature of the room, it is closed room but once inside it the viewers see an infinite expanse unfold right before their eyes. The Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away is the most recent evolution of processes and beliefs that Kusama incorporates in her works. This evolution can be seen when we compare Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away to her earlier works like Infinity Mirrored Room: Phalli’s Field and Narcissus Garden.
In Kusama’s first Infinity Mirrored Room, Infinity Mirrored Room: Phalli’s Field, she used the phallic shapes to create an endless field inside the mirrored room. Infinity Mirrored Room: Phalli’s Field was a way for Kusama to work on her anxiety and fear of sex. This has used this theme a few times, and when compared to Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away you see how Kusama is now expressing the vastness of the universe. Kusama wanted Infinity Mirrored Room: Phalli’s Field to be a “physically charged environment” where the viewers would interact with the inanimate objects. This interaction is not the same in Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away, instead the viewer is absorbed into the room by the rhythmic nature of the pulsating lights. Though subject matter differs there are a few similarities between Infinity Mirrored Room: Phalli’s Field and Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away. Polka dots are present in both pieces, in Infinity Mirrored Room: Phalli’s Field they are found on the phallic shapes, and in Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away they are the pulsing LEDs. The childishness of the polka dots is negated by the act of the viewer seeing themselves “fragmented and reflected to infinity.”
A year after Infinity Mirrored Room: Phalli’s Field, Kusama was spotted at the Venice Biennale with reflective balls, she called the piece Narcissus Garden. The subject matter Narcissus Garden is another example of Kusama’s beliefs. In Narcissus Garden the viewer sees only themselves and some of the surroundings in the reflection. Thus, being made to focus in on themselves. In the Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away the viewer can lose themselves, from the combination of pulsating lights and the reflected images fading into infinity. The interaction required of the viewer for Narcissus Garden and Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away are similar in that both require the viewer to interact with the piece in a visual and spatial manner. However, Narcissus Garden does a have a tactile interaction which is missing in the Infinity Mirrored Room: The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away.
Why are the viewers’ feeling the things that they do? This is due to the airtight space. Once the viewer goes in, they are encased and surrounded by lights. The water gives a sense of tranquility, and the room soon becomes a hypnotic experience, that is both captivating and overwhelming to the senses.
