Self-Portrait
Medium: Lithograph with collage on Verin d’Arches paper
[4 plates, 4 colors, 4 runs]
Year: 1982
Image: 22.5 x 15.5 cm (8.9 x 6.1 inches)
Sheet: 35.5 x 27.5 cm (14 x 10.8 inches)
Edition: 100
Artist’s Proofs: 3 AP
Printer’s Proof: 3 PP
Publisher: BOX Gallery, Nagoya
Printer: Shimo-oka Yoshiaki
Literature: ABE 9
Yayoi Kusama Prints 1979-2007, ABE PUBLISHING LTD, Number 9, Illustrated page 17
Signed, titled, numbered, and dated in pencil
This lithograph presents a stylized self-portrait by Yayoi Kusama, executed in the early 1980s, a period when she was increasingly translating the language of her paintings into graphic form. The composition is frontal and hieratic: the figure is centered, symmetrical, and isolated against a densely patterned background, asserting presence rather than psychological narrative. The surface is constructed through Kusama’s signature visual vocabulary, repetitive cellular forms, net-like crackling lines, and polka dots, applied uniformly across hair, clothing, and background. These motifs dissolve traditional distinctions between figure and ground. The face, pale and freckled with dots, is calm and mask-like, devoid of expressive drama. This emotional neutrality is deliberate: Kusama does not seek likeness in the Western portrait tradition, but symbolic self-representation through pattern.
Color plays a precise structural role. The red garment dominates the lower half of the image, suggesting vitality and physical presence, while the pink background creates a soft yet insistent visual pressure around the figure. Black and white in the hair and facial outlines impose order, containment, and rhythm. The green collar introduces a controlled chromatic interruption, preventing the composition from becoming purely ornamental. Conceptually, the work reflects Kusama’s long-standing interest in self-obliteration. By covering her own image with the same repetitive motifs that populate her pumpkins, flowers, and nets, she positions herself as both subject and object, absorbed into the infinite visual field she has spent her career constructing. This self-portrait is less about identity than about continuity: the artist as one element within a larger, obsessive system.
Seoul Auction: 27 February 2024
Estimated: KRW 20,000,000 – 50,000,000
KRW 23,600,000 / USD 17,725
AUCTION RECORD FOR SELF-PORTRAIT
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-Portrait, 1982
Lithograph and collage
Signed, titled, dated and numbered 100/100 on the recto
Auction Results
SBI Art Auction: 12 July 2025
Estimated: JPY 1,000,000 – 1,500,000
JPY 1,437,500 / USD 9,755
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-Portrait (Kusama 9), 1982
Lithograph, collage
Signed, titled, dated and numbered
HC aside from the edition of 100
SBI Art Auction: 12 April 2025
Estimated: JPY 1,000,000 – 1,500,000
JPY 1,207,500 / USD 8,400
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-portrait (Kusama 9), 1982
Lithograph, collage
Signed, titled, dated and numbered
From the edition of 100
iART Auction Tokyo: 20 April 2024
Estimated: JPY 800,000 – 1,500,000
JPY 1,840,000 / USD 11,900
YAYOI KUSAMA
SELF PORTRAIT, 1982
Lithograph
Signed
Seoul Auction: 27 February 2024
Estimated: KRW 20,000,000 – 50,000,000
KRW 23,600,000 / USD 17,725
AUCTION RECORD FOR SELF-PORTRAIT
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-Portrait, 1982
Lithograph and collage
Signed, titled, dated and numbered 100/100 on the recto
SBI Art Auction: 28 January 2023
Estimated: JPY 1,000,000 – 1,500,000
JPY 1,667,500 / USD 12,846
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-portrait (Kusama 9), 1982
Lithograph, collage
Signed, titled, dated and numbered
From the edition of 100
Est-Ouest Auctions Tokyo: 24 September 2022
Estimated: JPY 1,300,000 – 1,800,000
JPY 2,057,000 / USD 14,460
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-portrait (Kusama 9), 1982
Lithograph, collage
Signed, titled, dated and numbered on the margin
K Auction: 25 May 2022
Estimated: KRW 15,000,0000 – 30,000,000
KRW 18,000,000 (Hammer)
KRW 20,700,000 / USD 16,415
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-Portrait, 1982
Lithograph
Signed, dated, titled and numbered on the recto
Edition: 13/100
Christie’s Hong-Kong: 21 April 2022
Estimated: HKD 80,000 -100,000
HKD 119,700 / USD 15,260
YAYOI KUSAMA (B. 1929)
Self-Portrait, 1982
Lithograph and collage on paper
Titled in Japanese, signed, dated and numbered ‘90/100 Yayoi Kusama 1982’ (lower edge)
Mallet Japan: 9 December 2021
Estimated: JPY 800,000 – 1,300,000
JPY 1,400,000 (Hammer)
JPY 1,631,000 / USD 14,370
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-portrait, 1982
Lithograph in colours with collage on Arches
Signed
From the edition of 100
Mainichi Auction: 3 September 2021
Estimated: JPY 800,000 – 1,300,000
JPY 1,350,000 / USD 12,310
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-portrait, 1982
Lithograph
Signed
From the edition of 100
Mainichi Auction: 31 July 2021
Estimated: JPY 800,000 – 1,300,000
JPY 1,600,000 (Hammer)
JPY 1,864,000 / USD 16,990
YAYOI KUSAMA
Self-portrait, 1982
Lithograph
Signed
From the edition of 100