White Nets, 2007
Acrylic on canvas
161.9×161.9 cm (63.7×63.7 inches)
Signed, titled and dated 2007 on the reverse

Provenance
OTA Fine Arts, Tokyo
Private Collection, Geneva
Sotheby’s, London, February 5, 2009, lot 8
Acquired by the present owner from the above sale

 

Sotheby’s New-York: 15 May 2013
USD 581,000

Source: Sotheby’s
(#178) Yayoi Kusama (sothebys.com)

 

Like a child searching for figures in the clouds, viewers follow the easy arcs of Kusama’s infinity net paintings, under the spell of repetition, looking for more. Lured into discovering constellations within the curving links on her canvases, paint builds up across the surface creating shapes and forms, leading the eye as it travels over the rolling rhythms of white paint.

The soft, monochromatic composition of White Nets from 2007 is the perfect scalein which to become engulfed in Kusama’s web. Viewed from a distance the painting resembles an eyelet pattern or even lace but as the tranquil gestures become more apparent and the mesmerizing pattern gives way to the illusion of space, and viewers get lost in the intertwined white strokes – like waves of suds or bubbles. The forms loop fluidly in unending swirls across the picture plane consuming the viewers and their perception of time and space.