MASTER OF LIGHT & DARK - by Michaela Hall
Light and dark are key to our mood, our perceptions and our experiences in everyday life. When you play with these two states that are usually predictable something really interesting and wonderful happens and we experience new spaces and feelings that are nostalgic and futuristic at the same time, in play the states can transport us to new places and meaning and the spectrum of possibility with light and dark in creativity is endless.
It wouldn’t seem right to be discussing light and dark without a nod to one of my favourite artists, Yayoi Kusama. So today, my exploration of light and dark is dedicated entirely to her work and a fantastic exhibition I visited in late 2024.
The Japanese artist is famous for her play on light and dark with her infinity rooms and other various installations that rely on reflection, light and dark spaces. There’s a reason that her exhibitions sell out within hours of being released, and its that the spaces feel like stepping into a new galactic magical world that is carefully crafted by the artist to be completely unique and timeless. I was lucky enough to visit one of these in Porto last year at the Serralves Museum of Contemporary art. In the exhibition spanning her works from 1945 to present, a focal point was the room containing an installation with a signature black and white polka dot theme. The room on entering was initially very dark, painted entirely in black, with inflatable spheres moving very slowly covered in white polka dots, with almost unrecognisable mirrors on the wall, thus using light and dark to play with the perspectives of the room. The inside of this room stood a barely visible black box at its centre, when you eventually found this and entered it was an explosively beautiful infinity room filled with the same theme, but this time bright, light and infinite due to mirrors. This infinity box was the exact opposite to its outer environment, while at the same time having an identical theme. The journey through this dual installation as a result was a spectacular and disorientating journey through light and dark, showing the full power of the two states and how it can affect our space.
What most gallery visitors were unaware of is that the exhibition didn’t stop in the gallery space. Kusama had already played with light and dark in an interior setting, and now another focal point of the exhibition played with light and dark in an outer environment. The gallery itself is housed in acres of land, with lakes, treetop paths and other dedicated buildings to cinema, exhibitions, and farming. While walking along a treetop path I first saw Kusama’s installation in a pond down below of hundreds of metallic shiny spheres moving about in the wind of their own accord. The spheres, which matched up with her signature polka dot theme were left to roam and their reflective surfaces in the bright Portuguese sun reflected patterns and reflections all around them as well as on each other. These reflections also acted infinitely as in the cube in the gallery and similarly Kusama set up the work to rely on the light and dark periods outside to transform it into different versions of itself, looking very different at night in moonlight to the day with direct sunlight.
Kusama is a master of much more than light and dark, she’s a master of perception, reflection, pattern and repetition, colour, and viewer engagement. However, in this exhibition focusing on the pieces mentioned – she manages to illustrate in totally different environments the power of light and dark and how the balance of this in an artwork can be transformational to the area in which it sits. Light and dark is a powerful tool we might not often immediately see, but that always has a part in our experience of an artwork and how we feel in that moment.