For my second artist, I looked at Yoyoi Kasumi as they were my favourite growing up throughout high school due to one of their exhibits that has been running since the year I was born, all the way in 2002. The exhibit was/is The Obliteration Room. It’s an interactive and family-friendly gallery practice that lets the audience/viewer be active in the creation of the art itself. With a sheet of colourful stickers for each person who enters the plain white room, the room slowly fills head to toe in bright, saturated circles. I went visited and took part in this exhibit when it was showing in Auckland Art Gallery Toi O TÄmaki in 2018 and the joy and inspiration I got from that has stuck with me and my own art practice to this day.
The inspiration I got from the exhibit wasn’t the actual content of the art, but the way in which people got to interact with it. That’s what I want with my future art practice and when I will begin to show my work, I want the same level of excitement, family-friendly, fun participation that makes for an interesting art outcome but also just an interesting experience. When I went through Yoyoi’s obliteration room, my friends and I were laughing at each other trying to see who could jump the highest to put their dots, or finding the best place to put them, or even sticking them on our noses. I want the audience’s same level of interaction and energy/feelings when interacting with my future work.
Here’s a photo I took of my friend back in 2018 of the sticker on her nose, and a timelapse of the obliteration room being covered in the sticker dots uploaded by Auckland Art Gallery Toi O TÄmaki: https://youtu.be/gbNElQKqXgc
