Yayoi Kusama // Summer Night, 1979

  • Yayoi Kusama, Summer Night, 1979. Acrylic on paper, 51 × 64.5 cm, signed and dated. A late 1970s work reflecting Kusama’s shift to intimate, introspective practice in Japan.
    Summer Night, 1979
    Acrylic on paper with signed original backing board, 51 × 64.5 cm (20 × 25 3/4 in.)
    © Yayoi Kusama. Image reproduced for educational and informational purposes only. 
     
    Painted in 1979, Summer Night demonstrates Kusama’s deepening commitment to translating her inner visions into works of lyrical intensity during her post-New York years in Japan. The use of acrylic on paper highlights both immediacy and delicacy, while the layered signing and titling reinforce her meticulous control over authorship and presentation. The atmospheric title suggests an interplay between external environment and inner experience, a theme that runs throughout her late 1970s practice.
     
    This work forms part of Kusama’s broader return to smaller, studio-based compositions in Japan, where repetition and psychological resonance replaced the scale and spectacle of her 1960s New York practice. Through works like Summer Night, she transformed quiet, intimate formats into powerful reflections of her enduring obsessions.

  • “I wanted to start a new art movement, to change society with my art.”

     – Yayoi Kusama

    Summer Night embodies the transition between Kusama’s avant-garde international presence and the deeply introspective body of work that would define her subsequent decades. In works such as this, she shows how personal vision and private ritual could resonate universally, turning intimate materials into a meditation on obsession, infinity, and psychological depth.