On more than one occasion, I have had the opportunity to liken
an art exhibition to an amusement park funhouse. A lot of
contemporary art—installation art, in particular—lends itself to
such an unflattering analogy.
However one configures it, installations eschew the nuances of
high art for the spectacle of theater or, should one say, the
theatrical. One leading practitioner of the form stated that his
aim was to “control” the viewer, and the most telling attribute of
installation art is its distrust of aesthetic engagement. In
taking over “the white cube” of the gallery, installations
overwhelm and, at times, harass the viewer. Given the desperation
inherent in such endeavors, who wouldn’t prefer the attractions of
a roadside carny?
The re-creation of Yayoi Kusama’s Infinity Mirror Room
(1965), as seen in the exhibition “Love Forever: Yayoi Kusama,
1958–
1968,” was like a funhouse but in a good way—diverting and silly.
Inside a gallery lined with mirrors, the viewer confronted
innumerable polka-dotted phalluses made of stuffed fabric; they
were, almost literally, the “prizes” found in a carnival midway
(albeit a peculiar one). Gallerygoers were
allowed inside Infinity Room one at a time, and greeted it—and
incoming visitors—
with a smile that was equal parts mirth and
embarrassment. The comedy of Kusama’s refracted priapism is not
unrelated to the more outré
tendencies of the
1960s and has a woozy charm. Could this mean that the doodads of
a flower child are preferable to the jaded ironies of our current
crop of