 Yayoi Kusama is a female Japanese contemporary artist. She is one of the world’s most iconic & celebrated artists working today. Her work primarily consisted in sculpture & installation, but she also has been active in painting, performance, film, fashion, poetry, fiction, & other arts. Since #WomensHistory Month is March, reading books about influential women & integrating them with an invitation is truly a powerful way to connect the two. We read the books Yayoi Kusama Covered Everything in Dots and Wasn't Sorry by Fuasto Gilberti  and Yayoi Kusama From Here to Infinity by Sarah Suzuki and Ellen Weinstein. Â
We invited the children to recreate art inspired by Yayoi Kusama through a collaborative invitation to create. First we placed cut out poster paper of circles, mushrooms, butterflies, flowers, & pumpkins. Then we provided spray bottles filled with Colorations Liquid Watercolors. The children were invited first to spray the poster paper with the spray bottles. Once it dried they were given dot stickers and were invited to freely create all over poster paper.
Collaborative art in early childhood education fosters a sense of community, promotes SED, & enhances problem solving skills as children learn to work together, share ideas, & appreciate diverse perspectives. Together the children create freely, explore different techniques, & discover art in their own way in their own time. This builds their confidence, fosters their cognitive skills, & when they become aware of all the different ways they can do art, make predictions, plan it out/problem solve, everything comes full circle in believing they can create anything just like Yayoi Kusama!
Here are 3 other ways to explore Yayoi Kusama: