THE APPEAL OF MULTIPLES! YAYOI KUSAMA'S PRINTS AND EDITIONED SCULPTURES

Odile Chen / Ravenel Quarterly No. 38 / 2022-03-09

In August 2021, Typhoon Lupit violently struck the landmark of Seikoku, the Seto Inland Sea—Yayoi Kusama's gigantic sculpture of a yellow pumpkin. The yellow pumpkin was tossed about by the strong waves and battered by torrential rains, and collectors worldwide were heartbroken. That terrifying image remains vivid in their heads to this day. In 2021, the headlines were constantly filled with news related to Kusama. Along with stories about the typhoon and her retrospective exhibition at a museum, the news reported that the value of Kusama has been called the "most expensive female artist alive." In autumn 2008, collections compiled over half a century by artist Donald Judd (1928–1994), Kusama's long-deceased good friend, went on the market. Kusama's white Infinity Nets oil painting series "No. 2" sold at auction for a record-setting US$5.792 million. Even though this occurred during the financial crisis, Kusama still holds that record today. Polka dots are Kusama's obsession, and pumpkins are her representative symbols. In recent years, the new art market economy has grown. Kusama's arts, both antiquated and fashionable, continue to attract new generations of collectors. On December 1, 2021, two polka-dot pumpkin pieces consecutively set record highs for Kusama's paintings and sculptures: HK$62.54 million (US$8,058,937 or NT$224 million) and HK$55.45 million (US$7,145,314 or NT$200 million), respectively. According to a report by Artprice.com, In 2021, over 700 or 800 of Kusama's works are sold at auction, with sales totaling approximately US$200 million. This figure makes her one of the ten bestselling artists worldwide, with a transaction rate of 90%. Kusama has a stable spot on the wish lists of numerous collectors.

I strongly promoted Kusama's works in the Arts and Investment column in the first issue of Ravenel , a quarterly first published in spring 2012, in an article titled "Bullish Outlook for Works by Yayoi Kusama ‘The Queen of Polka Dots'". In that article, I introduced her works and the market view. Ten years have passed since then. Although Kusama is advanced in age and mobility-challenged, she still diligently creates new artworks, not to meet any particular goal but to satisfy her child-like heart, which seeks love and peace. Her diligence has moved Kusama fans worldwide. In the last decade, except for in 2019, when the market price was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, the value of Kusama's works has been constantly rising. According to Artprice.com, in the last decade, the price index of her work increased from 239.96 to 851.34, which is a growth of 255%, or an average increase of over 2.5 times. In the global auctions of Kusama's work in 2021, prints accounted for nearly half of the works (398/841), reflecting the scale of the print market.

As spring 2022 begins, we should discuss Kusama's multiples, prints and editioned sculptures, which together account for over half of her personal works on the market. Multiples used to be a good method through which collectors of limited means could start building their collections. The collection of prints has a long history, offering collectors with budget limitations favorable opportunities because preserving and maintaining them have relatively low costs. Etchings, lithographs, woodcuts, silkscreens, and embossing are the results of close collaboration between artists and professional print studios. As the market value of an artist grows, the value of the prints also increases. Today, Kusama's prints are no longer affordable to collectors of limited means—they begin at tens of thousands of US dollars. For example, "Amour pour Toujours", a limited edition print with only edition of 60 worldwide, sold at auction for a new high of US$466,200 (approximately NT$13 million) on October 19, 2021. The most expensive print, Kusama's single-print Pumpkin Black (ed. 8+AP4+HC4), sold for JPY22.99 million (US$201,208 or NT$5.63 million) on November 18, 2021, at the New Art Est-Ouest in Tokyo.

Prints are the endless footsteps of life

Kusama has preserved a comprehensive collection of files and photos, and she greatly values where her creations end up. Even for multiples, she records in detail the number of each piece produced and its details, assembling them into a book. In 2005, "All Prints of Yayoi Kusama 1979-2004 " (341 prints) was first issued with both Japanese and English chronologies and became extremely popular. In 2011, 2013, and 2017, more works were included, and new editions were printed. The most comprehensive edition to date is the 2017 edition. In the preface of Yayoi Kusama Prints 1979-2017 (457 prints), Kusama stated, "I have been making prints ever since I was captivated by their allure, and am constantly overwhelmed by the brilliance arising from within the process of making them." Thus, her continuous devotion to creating prints with splendid and intricate topics for 30 or 40 years is in itself an art.

Her ideal is, "In creating art, every day is a discovery of life amidst the daily activity of people whose existence is ephemeral. I keep looking back on my bygone days, reminding myself that prints are the endless footsteps of life. With this thought, I keep on sending to many people my inexhaustible, intense feelings toward all things through prints, duplicating them in large numbers. I create prints with all my heart for the people who love them. Whenever I work on prints, I am filled with a wish to convey to the people my thought in a deep, straight and pure way with clear brightness. This is why I can keep creating prints. I wish to make countless duplicates of the same visual field and spread them across the world. This is my longing for formative arts."

With a passion to seek beauty in form and a willingness to share, in 1979, Kusama issued her first print work, "Going to the Field with Shoes on", a silkscreen. Between 1979 and 2017, she released 457 prints, reflecting her ample creativity. Among them, 99 featured pumpkins, clearly reflecting the importance of pumpkins in her mind. She derived the flower beds and vegetable gardens from her childhood memories of her family. As a teenager, she studied Japanese painting in Kyoto. She once earned praise for depicting several pumpkins in a row. The round, fat, cute little pumpkins brought Kusama a feeling of warmth, stability, and redemption. That poetic tranquility was transformed into holy spiritual sustenance, offering Kusama, who was tortured by mental illness, the motivation she needed to keep moving forward. Throughout her life, pumpkins have been a constant focus of her creations.

In fact, in her New York period, Kusama incorporated print elements in her 1963 art installation "Aggregation: One Thousand Boats Show." The work included 999 lithographs of boats covering the walls of a gallery. The boats, filled with soft, phallic silver sculptures, formed an image with strong visual tension. In 1982, Kusama held a retrospective exhibition in Japan. Although she had earned extremely high regard in New York, her art was not approved, and her prints were only used as the setting for the exhibition. Only when she met the print artist Tokuzo Okabe did she consider her prints as independent artworks, and she worked with Okabe's print studio for many years. During this period, she also collaborated with print artist Kihachi Kimura to produce copper plate etchings and with Ishida Ryoichi and Shimooka Yoshiaki to produce silkscreens and lithographs.

In 1998, Kusama met Frank Riva, who was making traditional prints in France. He was married to Misa, a woman from Osaka, and he founded a company using their initials as the name: FMR Trading Limited (Les Editions d'FMR). Kusama and Riva had matching ideals, and they collaborated several times. Specifically, Kusama wished to engage in exchanges with the Paris art scene. For example, she collaborated with La Monnaie de Paris and created the famous desk-top version of the bronze pumpkin sculptures. She also created the Limoges five-color ceramic pumpkin sets. Notably, the most expensive printing collection of Kusama to date, "Amour pour Toujours," was also issued by FMR. Kusama's prints are worth hundreds of thousands to millions of Taiwan dollars. Those featuring pumpkins are always the most popular ones.

Editioned Sculptures

Kusama is an artist with diverse developments. In addition to her paintings, her three-dimensional works are also outstanding. Because sculptures and art installations take up a large amount of space, they are mostly produced for exhibitions or special projects. In her early years, she integrated performance arts and created countless art installations, cementing her place in art history. In her later years, she has mainly collaborated with her primary agency, Ota Fine Arts (who has represented her since 1995), and overseas agencies such as the Victoria Miro Gallery (since 1998), the Gagosian Gallery (2009 to 2012), and the David Zwiner Gallery (since 2013). Through these collaborations, she has created works to meet the demands of museums, biennales, art exhibitions, and the demands of certain collectors. These works have included gigantic pumpkin sculptures, as well as sculptures integrating acrylic oil painting and portraits, such as the statue of Venus, flower sculptures, dog sculptures, balls, and furniture. In 2012, Kusama worked with the fashion brand Louis Vuitton to promote a large-scale exhibition and launch polka dot bags, clothes, and sets of books about prints, causing a rage in fashion.

Kusama's three-dimensional works are far outnumbered by her oil paintings. Naturally, her editioned sculptures are rarer than her prints. Of the sculpture multiples that have appeared at auctions, the large copper pumpkins have been the most popular and most expensive. According to the transaction list of the auction market in the appendix, one pumpkin, one of a 2016 limited edition of eight yellow copper pumpkins 67.3 cm in height, sold for JPY186.4 million (approximately US$1.68 million or NT$46.77 million). That was the most expensive editioned sculpture in the auction market to date. However, in the top markets in the past, several sets of large copper pumpkins have come on the market. For example, in 2015, yellow copper pumpkins (241cm, 187cm, and 110 cm in height, respectively, limited edition of 8 with 2 AP) cast in 2014 were exhibited at the Victoria Miro Gallery in the United Kingdom in 2015, with gallery prices of US$2 million, US$1.5 million and US$1.2 million, respectively. Seven years later, their mean value had at least doubled. The enterprise collection, located in Building A of the CTBC Financial Park in Nangang, Taiwan, holds the largest piece, which is 241 cm tall. It is undoubtedly worth NT$100 million.

The bronze pumpkins with a limited edition of 100 that were only 28 cm in height, cast by La Monnaie de Paris, and issued by FMR in 1998 were relatively common on the art market. This pumpkin sold at auction in New York for US$156,250 (approximately NT$4.7 million). A bronze pumpkin from this collection was worth only about 10 thousand euros on the 2007 auction market. The price increase is stunning.

Ceramic and resin are also commonly used in Kusama's recent multiples or cultural and creative products. For example, in 2003, she collaborated with Villeroy & Boch, Germany, and issued 7 limited-edition Pumpkin Chess sets, one of which sold at auction for US$398,500 (approximately 12 million) in New York 10 years ago. Also, through the aforementioned FMR, in 2000, Kusama and the Atelier S. Gerard studio in Paris together issued a limited collection of 15 red and yellow etched resin pumpkins with diameters of about 30 cm. One pair has sold for as much as US$144,272 (approximately NT$4.33 million). In 2002, she launched four types of five-colored ceramic pumpkin sets, produced by Limoges France. Each pumpkin has a diameter of 10 cm, and only 130 or 100 were released, respectively. They often appear at major auctions or art exhibitions, and their current value is approximately US$40,000–60,000. Also, in 2013 and 2015, FMR released Kusama's gold and silver high heels. Each pair was limited to 30 editions + 10 AP. Their issuing price was naturally not as high as that of the works featuring pumpkins; they were priced at about US$20,000 each.

 

As the price rises, counterfeits enter the market

As the market value of Kusama's work grew over the years, counterfeit oil paintings began to pop up on the market. However, the collectors have become more alert. Before they make a purchase, they check if the work comes with a Registration Card from the artist's studio as a guarantee. For authentic pieces, Kusama's studio offers registration cards to the collectors. In the early years, even her prints could be registered by email. However, seeing a potential profit, pirates counterfeited the works on a large scale, even faking copies for an entire exhibition or peripheral products for sale. According to the Yayoi Kusama Foundation, in 2018, the joint art exhibitions of Kusama and Takashi Murakami in seven Chinese cities, namely, Shenzhen, Qingdao, Wuhan, Tianjin, Shanghai, Changsha, and Guangzhou, featured copyright infringements and counterfeits. At Kusama's studio, the number of emails enquiring about the authenticity of works flooded in, exceeding their capacity to cope with them. Even counterfeit registration cards have been discovered.

In December 2019, Kusama's studio officially announced that it had adjusted the registration fee, and they issued a new version of the registration card. The old registration cards remained valid, but collectors could mail them in to receive new ones. Still, the studio announced that it would no longer assist in the certification of multiples, such as limited editions (including prints), products, and novelties. This raises an important question: What should collectors do if they are interested in Kusama's works? I hereby offer these collectors several suggestions:

(1) Get references such as Yayoi Kusama Prints 1979-2017 . To date, they are available from online and brick-and-mortar bookstores. Familiarize yourself with the issuing of her prints, and understand the name of the studio, type of print, color of the print, and paper used.

(2) Kusama's prints inherited the craftsmanship and aesthetics of Japan and France, so they are made carefully, with beautiful colors. The paper used is of high quality, and the colors are never off, nor the lines blurry. Collectors should also be able to authenticate the signature and handwriting.

(3) Some print studios or producers of editioned sculptures will provide relevant documents, such as the original packaging, as proof.

(4) Visit Kusama's official website, yayoi-kusama.jp, to determine whether the status of editioned sculptures and cultural and creative products, and the number of units issued, are correct.

(5) Pay attention to the source of multiples for purchase. Purchase them from reputable agencies, galleries, or auction companies. Safeguard the receipt and relevant certificates of purchase. Should a dispute arise, the seller from whom you made the purchase will be more willing to assume responsibility.

Her life-long narcissism, and our eternal respect

Kusama's life has been filled with more pain than pleasure. She has said that she feels like ending her life every day. However, she bravely clings to life through her art. She has been fighting for 93 years—a thought that gives one pause. Born in 1929 to a rich family in Matsumoto in the Nagano prefecture of Japan, she had a childhood filled with trauma and torture due to her parents' marital discord. She developed paranoid obsessive-compulsive disorder early on, and she constantly experienced abnormal illusions and visions. In 1957, she flew to the United States to start her art adventure. She was a member of the contemporary art movement in the United States from the 1950s to the 1970s, revealing her free innovative spirit. She returned to Japan in 1973.

In 1977, Kusama volunteered to move into an extended care facility, and she remains in such care to this day. Despite being a patient, she commutes every weekday to a three-story building near the nursing home to paint from 9:30 am to 6 pm. Except for dining and handling a few necessary conversations, she remains in front of her painting table in her studio on the second floor. On weekends, when her assistants are on leave or the weather is inclement, she stays in her small room in the nursing home and keeps painting.

The creative process allows her to continue her life. She has had a life more splendid than anyone else's. In addition to creating paintings, sketches, sculptures, movies, performing arts, and immersive installations, she is also a skilled author of fiction and fashion designer. In her world, her incomparable self-confidence and narcissism make her more beautiful than anyone else.

Her artistic achievements were even more glorious in her later years. In 1993, she represented Japan at the Venice Biennale, where she was the most popular artist of the exhibition. In 2011, her large-scale retrospective exhibition was featured in Europe at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sof?a in Madrid and the Centre Pompidou in Paris; in 2012, at Tate Modern in London, and at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. Moreover, she also had comprehensive retrospective exhibitions in Asia and in Central and South America, as well as in Norway, Sweden, Washington, D.C., Seattle, Toronto, Taiwan, Singapore, Jakarta, Australia, South Korea, and Japan.

Times Magazine listed Kusama as one of the most influential people of 2016. In 2017, the Yayoi Kusama Museum was founded in Tokyo to foreground her artistic achievements and contributions. In more recent years, such as 2018, her works were included in the New York MoMA PS1. In 2021, her works were exhibited in Berlin. In 2022, large-scale exhibitions are to be held in Tel Aviv-Yafo in Israel and in Tate Modern in London. Kusama, who has long been considered one of the best female artists in the world, has long fulfilled the dream she pursued as a young woman.