Australia: The Obliteration Room

Have you heard of Japanese avant-garde artist Yayoi Kusama? At the age of 10, she began to experience hallucinations, seeing light, auras and polka dots. The dots, especially, became her obsession and, eventually, a theme common to many of her creations. In Yayoi’s hallucinations, the world around her got covered with dots and she felt like she had begun to “self-obliterate”—a word she uses to describe the feeling of losing oneself and becoming one with the universe. The Obliteration Room, an interactive project Yayoi first displayed at Australia’s Queensland Art Gallery in 2002, tried to convey this feeling. It invited adults and children alike to stick polka dot-shaped stickers on the interiors of a stark white house that functioned as a canvas. With every sticker, people ‘obliterated’ the house and saw the world through Yayoi’s eyes. The Queensland Art Gallery is currently hosting a new edition of The Obliteration Room up till February 4 next year. So if you’re down under, stop by and contribute to this peculiar universe. Entry free. See qagoma.qld.gov.au.