BOOK FORMAT Hardcover, 8 x 13 in. / 96 pgs / 48 bw.
PUBLISHING STATUS Pub Date 8/23/2016 Active
DISTRIBUTION D.A.P. Exclusive Catalog: FALL 2016 p. 11
PRODUCT DETAILS ISBN 9788792877598TRADE List Price: $45.00 CAD $60.00 GBP £39.00
AVAILABILITY In stock
TERRITORY WORLD
"Hans Christian Andersen is a dream born in my heart. I want to be a mermaid. I place all my hopes for the future in the mermaid, who is a symbol of all good hearts and of love." - Yayoi Kusama
The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen & Yayoi Kusama
A Fairy Tale of Infinity and Love Forever
Edited by Lærke Rydal Jørgensen, Marie Laurberg, Michael Juul Holm.
Kusama's delicate drawings both illustrate and interpret Hans Christian Andersen's tale
Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale “The Little Mermaid” (1839), a story about a girl from the sea who followed her dreams and suffered a disastrous fate on land, is known all over the world (particularly in its animated incarnation). But the familiar story is brought to new life in this gorgeous edition, a collaboration between the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art and artist Yayoi Kusama.
Paired with Hans Christian Andersen’s original text, the densely patterned, undulating line drawings of Kusama’s Love Forever series (2004–7) conjure up storms in the roiling waves of the ocean, the Little Mermaid’s vast underwater kingdom and her longing to live in the human world. Kusama’s fertile, endlessly repeating forms are an ideal match for the poetic and disturbing universe evoked in the fairy tale; the result is a true collaboration. Kusama’s drawings both illustrate and interpret Andersen’s story, bringing it to terrifying life, and Andersen’s words lend narrative content to Kusama’s landscapes of unblinking eyes, curling tendrils and disembodied profiles.
Yayoi Kusama (born 1929) first left Japan at the age of 28, landing in late 1950s New York. Her oeuvre, now spanning more than 50 years, includes painting, performance, installations and environments, sculpture, film, fashion, design and literary work. She was recently named the world’s most popular artist, based on annual figures reported by The Art Newspaper for global museum attendance in 2014.
Featured image is reproduced from Hans Christian Andersen & Yayoi Kusama: The Little Mermaid.
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
Interview Magazine
Devon Ivie
Anderson's story is enhanced by Kusama's unique landscapes and Kusama's visuals are given new life within the narrative context. A harmonious collaboration, indeed.
Huffington Post
Priscilla Frank
At once whimsical and foreboding, the images perfectly capture the twisted imagination of The Little Mermaid’s writer.
Sleek
German Henry
Kusama not only managed to incorporate her distinctive style into the mesmerizing images, but she has also masterfully captured the intriguing and inspiring children’s story.
Hyperallergic
Claire Voon
Her bold, undulating lines, however, bring Andersen’s narrative to life, covering pages with waving and wriggling patterns; fanciful plants suggestive of wondrous aquatic wildlife; motifs resembling tentacles and waves; and an abundance of enigmatic, watchful eyes. The repetition of shapes and doodled figures forms a fluid stream of images around Andersen’s prose, giving it new and exciting energy. The images and text build a world that might just be as fantastic and mysterious as the one that the little mermaid saw when she ascended from the depths of the sea for the first time.
Art and Auction
Kusama's evocative drawings pave the way for new readings of the classic fairytale while the collaboration emphasizes the depth of Anderson's knowledge of the human condition and his understanding of human relationships.
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"Her skin was as soft and tender as a rose petal, and her eyes were as blue as the deep sea, but like all the others she had no feet. Her body ended in a fish tail." The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen & Yayoi Kusama: A Fairy Tale of Infinity and Love Forever combines a new, modernized translation of Andersen's original tale with drawings by celebrated Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama—whose work will be on view in dialogue with the natural world April 11–October 31, 2021, at the New York Botanical Gardens. Beautifully produced with an embossed, spot-varnished cover, vellum jacket and exquisite paper and printing, this book has been hard to keep in stock or in print due to high demand and rave reviews in media outlets like the Huffington Post, i-D/Vice, New York Magazine/The Cut and many more. continue to blog
BACK IN STOCK! Yayoi Kusama's instantly collectible illustrated edition of Hans Christian Andersen's dark nineteenth-century anti-Faustian fable comes wrapped in a smooth transparent vellum jacket and printed on deluxe matte paper, making it an exceptionally sophisticated gift this holiday season. "Andersen’s tale is the perfect springboard for Kusama’s fantastical imagery, which features women’s silhouettes abstracted into spindly tessellations that seem to proliferate all on their own," Priscilla Frank writes in the Huffington Post. "At once whimsical and foreboding, the images perfectly capture the twisted imagination of The Little Mermaid’s writer." continue to blog
FORMAT: Hbk, 8 x 13 in. / 96 pgs / 48 b&w. LIST PRICE: U.S. $45.00 LIST PRICE: CANADA $60 GBP £39.00 ISBN: 9788792877598 PUBLISHER: Louisiana Museum of Modern Art AVAILABLE: 8/23/2016 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Active AVAILABILITY: In stock TERRITORY: WORLD
The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen & Yayoi Kusama A Fairy Tale of Infinity and Love Forever
Published by Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. Edited by Lærke Rydal Jørgensen, Marie Laurberg, Michael Juul Holm.
Kusama's delicate drawings both illustrate and interpret Hans Christian Andersen's tale
Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale “The Little Mermaid” (1839), a story about a girl from the sea who followed her dreams and suffered a disastrous fate on land, is known all over the world (particularly in its animated incarnation). But the familiar story is brought to new life in this gorgeous edition, a collaboration between the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art and artist Yayoi Kusama.
Paired with Hans Christian Andersen’s original text, the densely patterned, undulating line drawings of Kusama’s Love Forever series (2004–7) conjure up storms in the roiling waves of the ocean, the Little Mermaid’s vast underwater kingdom and her longing to live in the human world. Kusama’s fertile, endlessly repeating forms are an ideal match for the poetic and disturbing universe evoked in the fairy tale; the result is a true collaboration. Kusama’s drawings both illustrate and interpret Andersen’s story, bringing it to terrifying life, and Andersen’s words lend narrative content to Kusama’s landscapes of unblinking eyes, curling tendrils and disembodied profiles.
Yayoi Kusama (born 1929) first left Japan at the age of 28, landing in late 1950s New York. Her oeuvre, now spanning more than 50 years, includes painting, performance, installations and environments, sculpture, film, fashion, design and literary work. She was recently named the world’s most popular artist, based on annual figures reported by The Art Newspaper for global museum attendance in 2014.
