Shanghai Pumpkin
Medium: Screenprint in colors on Katita-shi paper with Lame
[2 colors]
Year: 2010
Image: 53.5 x 45 cm (21.1 x 17.7 inches)
Sheet: 76×56 cm (30×22 inches)
Edition: 200
Artist’s Proofs: 32 AP
Printer’s Proofs: 4 PP
Hors Commerce: 4 HC
Printer: 360C GRAPHICS
Publisher: NPO Art.Art
Shanghai Expo Commemoration Prints Committee
Literature: ABE 360
Yayoi Kusama Prints 1979-2017, ABE PUBLISHING LTD, Number 360, Illustrated page 205
Signed, dated, and numbered in pencil on lower edge
This work was specially produced on the occasion of 2010 Shanghai Exposition by the artist.
Shanghai Pumpkin from 2010 belongs to Yayoi Kusama’s later graphic production, when her visual language is fully established and deliberately distilled. The composition is direct: a single pumpkin occupies the center of the image, set against a dark background animated by a fine net-like pattern. The absence of secondary motifs places the focus entirely on form, surface, and chromatic contrast.
Color is the defining element of this work. Unlike Kusama’s iconic yellow pumpkins or the more varied, polychromatic examples from the late 1980s and early 1990s, this print is organized around a restricted palette of red and black. The pumpkin is rendered in a saturated red tone, its surface structured by black polka dots that vary in scale and density, following the natural lobes of the form. This restrained chromatic choice lends the image a quieter, more concentrated presence, emphasizing rhythm and repetition over visual exuberance. The background net pattern, drawn in a lighter red against black, creates a subtle but persistent field of tension. As in many of Kusama’s works, the net suggests continuity and expansion, while the pumpkin remains clearly bounded and self-contained. The contrast between the finite outline of the pumpkin and the all-over background reinforces a recurring dynamic in her practice: containment set against infinity.
In this 2010 print, Kusama revisits the pumpkin not as a narrative or symbolic object, but as a stable structure capable of sustaining repetition over time. The limited color range and precise screenprinting underline a mature phase of her work, in which variation is achieved not through new motifs, but through measured shifts in color, density, and scale within a familiar form.
Auction Results
Mallet Japan: 4 December 2025
Estimated: JPY 6,000,000 – 10,000,000
JPY 19,500,000 (Hammer)
JPY 22,717,500 / USD 146,440
AUCTION RECORD FOR SHANGHAI PUMPKIN
YAYOI KUSAMA
Shanghai Pumpkin (Abe 360), 2010
Screenprint in colors with glass particles on Kakita-shi
Signed, titled, dated and numbered in pencil, from the edition of 200
(there were also 32 A.P.)
Published by NPO Art・Art and Shanghai Expo Commemoration Prints Committee
Printed by 360℃ GRAPHICS, with their blindstamp
SBI Art Auction: 25 October 2025
Estimated: JPY 5,000,000 – 8,000,000
JPY 7,705,000 / USD 50,420
YAYOI KUSAMA
A Pumpkin (Kusama 360), 2010
Screenprint, lamé
Signed, titled, dated and numbered
From the edition of 200
Printed by 360℃ GRAPHICS, Tokyo
Published by NPO Art・Art, Shanghai Expo Commemoration Prints Committee
Mainichi Auction: 18 October 2025
Estimated: JPY 7,000,000 – 10,000,000
JPY 12,650,000 / USD 84,015
YAYOI KUSAMA
Shanghai Pumpkin, 2010
ABE publishing (2017) No.360
Screenprint, lamé
Signed in the lower right margin
Titled, dated and ed.200 in the lower left margin
SBI Art Auction: 24 May 2024
Estimated: JPY 4,000,000 – 7,000,000
JPY 13,800,000 / USD 87,900
YAYOI KUSAMA
A Pumpkin (Kusama 360), 2010
Screenprint, lamé
Signed, titled, dated and numbered
From the edition of 200
Mainichi Auction: 14 March 2024
Estimated: JPY 5,000,000 – 7,000,000
JPY 13,800,000 / USD 93,125
YAYOI KUSAMA
Shanghai Pumpkin, 2010
ABE publishing (2017) No.360
Screenprint, lamé
Signed in the lower right margin
Titled, dated and ed.200 in the lower left margin
SBI Art Auction: 27 May 2023
Estimated: JPY 4,000,000 – 7,000,000
JPY 10,005,000 / USD 71,152
YAYOI KUSAMA
A Pumpkin (Kusama 360), 2010
Screenprint, lamé
Signed, titled, dated and numbered
From the edition of 200
New Art Est-Ouest Auction: 24 September 2022
Estimated: JPY 6,000,000 – 10,000,000
JPY 10,890,000 / USD 108,205
YAYOI KUSAMA
Shanghai Pumpkin, 2010
Screenprint, lamé
Signed, titled, dated and numbered on the margin
K Auction Seoul: 25 May 2022
Estimated: KRW 80,000,000 – 120,000,000
KRW 138,000,000 / USD 109,425
AUCTION RECORD FOR SHANGHAI PUMPKIN
YAYOI KUSAMA
Shanghai Pumpkin, 2010
Screenprint, lamé
Signed, titled, dated and numbered 119/200 on the front
Mainichi Auction: 22 May 2021
Estimated: JPY 3,000,000 – 5,000,000
JPY 5,600,000 (Hammer)
JPY 6,524,000 / USD 59,885
YAYOI KUSAMA
Shanghai Pumpkin, 2010
Screenprint
Signed
Edition: 118/200
China Guardian Hong-Kong: 8 August 2020
Estimated: HKD 250,000 – 350,000
HKD 413,000 / USD 53,285
YAYOI KUSAMA (b.1929)
Shanghai Pumpkin, 2010
Screenprint with lamé
Edition: 156/200
Numbered, titled in Chinese, and dated on bottom left
Signed in English on bottom right