Delta Air Lines is hitting Los Angeles Fashion Week with its first-ever fashion collection. In collaboration with multi-hyphenate artist Issa Rae, Delta is combatting the common discomforts of flying by equipping travelers with a line made for style and comfort created by small business designers across the country.
The full collection will debut at an LA Fashion Week event this Friday hosted by Issa. Your readers can tune in on Friday, Oct. 7 at 8 p.m. PT from the Delta Instagram or at DeltaRunwayRunwayCollection.com. Additionally, an exclusive and limited-edition drop of the items will be available for consumers to purchase on Friday, Oct. 7 when the livestream event wraps.
Elliott Advocacy, the nonprofit online consumer advocacy organization, has announced the release of its 2022 Readers Choice Award nominees, with voting beginning today here.
Sponsored by Medjet, the leading air medical transport membership program for travelers, the Elliott Advocacy Readers Choice Award is an annual recognition of companies in various consumer sectors that offered outstanding customer support and service that year. For 2022, readers nominated and voted for their favorite companies in 16 categories ranging from airlines to wireless service providers.
Finding the best customer service is more challenging than ever during a pandemic, says Christopher Elliott, founder of Ellio=tt Advocacy. The Readers Choice Award offers guidance to consumers, helping them make smarter purchasing decisions.
The Readers Choice Award, now in its 17th year, is widely recognized as one of the premier customer service honors in America. The full list of award categories and nominees for the 2022 Readers Choice Award includes:
Additional sponsorship for the Elliott Advocacy 2022 Readers Choice Award comes from Allianz and Southwest Airlines. Voting will be open through January 2022 and winners will be announced in February.A full list of previous Readers Choice Awards is available here.
Consumer Reports & PIRG Urge Airlines to Provide Full Refunds for Flights Canceled During Pandemic as Voucher Expiration Dates Approach
Groups Call for Airlines to Extend Voucher Expiration Dates Through At Least End Of 2022
With the one-year anniversary of the nationwide COVID-19 lockdown approaching, Consumer Reports and U.S. PIRG sent a letter to ten domestic airlines today calling on them to provide full refunds to consumers whose flights were canceled or affected by the pandemic. At the very least, the consumer groups are urging airlines to extend the expiration dates for vouchers they issued for canceled flights to the end of 2022 or longer.
“Millions of Americans who booked flights in good faith in 2020 were prevented from flying because of government lockdowns and safety concerns brought on by a once-in-a-century global pandemic,” said William J. McGee, Aviation Adviser to Consumer Reports. “The airline industry has received very generous support from taxpayers while stiff-arming its customers and treating their hard-earned dollars as interest-free loans. It’s time to provide consumers with the long-overdue refunds they rightfully deserve.”
The consumer groups’ letter notes that complaints to the U.S. Department of Transportation about airline refunds have jumped dramatically over the past year. In 2019, consumers submitted a total of 1,574 complaints about refunds to the DOT. Last year, that number increased 57-fold to 89,518 refund complaints.
Consumer Reports has been contacted by numerous customers frustrated that they couldn’t get a refund during lockdowns and who are concerned that they might not be able to travel before vouchers expire. An analysis by TripAction, a travel management company for businesses, found that 55 percent of vouchers for unused tickets will expire in 2021, and 45 percent will expire in 2022.
Many passengers were prevented from flying because of government restrictions, public health notices, or serious medical conditions that made flying during the pandemic unsafe. Far too many of the trips they booked will never happen, due to the cancellation (not postponement) of conferences, conventions, weddings, graduations, and family reunions.
While passengers on flights canceled by airlines are entitled to a full refund under federal law, a congressional analysis found that some carriers offered vouchers as the default option, requiring passengers to take extra steps to get a cash refund. Many airlines waited until the last minute to cancel scheduled flights, prompting concerned passengers to cancel their tickets and forfeit their legal right to a refund.
“It’s insulting and unfair that airlines haven’t offered refunds to all customers affected by the pandemic,” said Teresa Murray, Consumer Watchdog Director for U.S. PIRG. “Consumers certainly couldn’t have foreseen a once-in-a-lifetime global crisis. Our research has shown that travelers whose plans got canceled have to wade through refund policies likely written by a team of lawyers. They’re faced with figuring out the difference between a flight credit or a trip credit or a travel voucher and similar offers the airlines make to avoid giving people easy-to-understand cash in their pocket.”
A Consumer Reports review of airline voucher policies found nine different policies among ten different airlines. Many of these policies are hard to find on airline websites, and the airlines’ descriptions of their policies can be quite confusing and at times contradictory, based on conflicting rules for various dates of booking, travel, and cancellation. The consumer groups’ letter was sent to the CEOs of the following scheduled airlines: Alaska Airlines, Allegiant Air, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Frontier Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines, JetBlue Airways, Southwest Airlines, Spirit Airlines, and United Airlines.
360 Magazine is live at the NYBG KUSAMA Cosmic Nature Media Preview featuring Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. The KUSAMA Garden and Gallery Pass include access to all of the outdoor and indoor installations (1-9), Haupt Conservatory, Everett Children’s Adventure Garden, Tram Tour, and Garden grounds. The installations include:
Pumpkins Screaming About Love Beyond Infinity
Flower Obsession
Mertz Library Building Gallery
Paintings, collages, early sketches, other works
Walking Piece
Haupt Conservatory Galleries
Horticultural displays, tropical and desert collections
KUSAMA Garden Pass includes access to all outdoor installations (6-9), Everett Children’s Adventure Garden, and Garden grounds:
I Want to Fly to the Universe
Narcissus Garden
Ascension of Polka Dots on the Trees
Dancing Pumpkin
In addition, Infinity Mirrored Room – Illusion Inside the Heart: Exterior now on view to all ticket holders; interior access planned to begin this summer; separate timed-entry ticket required for interior access. More information is available on the NYBG website.
Garden Navigator – Explore the one million plants across NYBG’s 250 acres and find what you want to see. Visit the website for the navigation tool.
Forest Bathing: A meditative audio experience – Be fully present on this self-guided tour. Bathe your senses in the sights, smells, sounds, and sensations of the Thain Forest.
Audio Tours – Look for signs with instructions at stops throughout the Garden to learn about specific plants, gardens, and collections.
My Day At The Garden: Family Guide – Embark on an adventure with their kids and family activity guide, available at any ticket window or on the website.
Spring For Nature – 10 a.m. – 5:30 p.m. Kids of all ages can take a closer look at the wonders of plants and animals across the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden.
Bloomberg Connect App – Featuring audio tours, detailed plant images, and more; there’s something for everyone to enjoy. Free download available here.
Tickets Go on Sale to the Public on March 16, 2021, for The New York Botanical Garden’s Exclusive Presentation of KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature Featuring New Work by Celebrated Artist Yayoi Kusama
The exhibition, related programs, and accompanying publication reveal Kusama’s lifelong fascination with the natural world and its countless manifestations beginning in her childhood spent in the greenhouses and fields of her family’s seed nursery in Matsumoto, Japan. The exhibition includes works from throughout Kusama’s prolific career and multifaceted practice. By integrating seasonal horticultural displays, KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature further illuminates the power of nature that pervades the artist’s practice and dynamic body of work.
Multiple outdoor installations, including monumental sculptures of flora transform the Garden’s 250-acre landscape and the visitor experience. Her signature polka-dotted organic forms and mesmerizing paintings of plants and flowers are also represented. Recent vivid observations of nature, shown alongside earlier works that have never been publicly exhibited and those that are presented for the first time in the United States, trace Kusama’s connection to the natural world throughout her career.
Among the works created for and debuting in the exhibition are:
Dancing Pumpkin (2020), a monumental sculpture presented on the Haupt Conservatory Lawn.
I Want to Fly to the Universe (2020), a 13-foot-high biomorphic form presented in the Visitor Center; and,
Infinity Mirrored Room Illusion Inside the Heart(2020), an outdoor installation reflecting its environs.
Spectacular seasonal displays complement the artworks on view, making each visit unique as new plantings, textures, and palettes are introduced. Glorious outdoor displays of tulips and irises in spring give way to dahlias and sunflowers in summer, and masses of pumpkins and autumnal flowers in fall. In and around the Conservatory, Kusama’s plant-inspired polka-dotted sculptures are nestled among meadow grasses, bellflowers, water lilies, and other plantings. Stunning floral presentations bring to life one of Kusama’s paintings on view in the Mertz Library Building through a seasonal progression of violas, salvias, zinnias, and other colorful annuals. In fall, displays of meticulously trained kiku (Japanese for chrysanthemum), one of that country’s most heralded fall-flowering plants) will create a dramatic finale for the Conservatory displays.
KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature guest curator Mika Yoshitake, Ph.D., said, Kusama, cosmic nature is a life force that integrates the terrestrial and celestial orders of the universe from both the micro- and macrocosmic perspectives she investigates in her practice. Her explorations evoke meanings that are both personal and universal. Nature is not only a central source of inspiration, but also integral to the visceral effects of Kusama’s artistic language in which organic growth and the proliferation of life are made ever-present.
In the Garden
On the Conservatory Lawn, visitors encounter the monumental Dancing Pumpkin, a 16-foot-high bronze sculpture painted in black and yellow. Both playful and powerful, it is sited in an immersive landscape of river birches, flowering plants, grasses, and ferns. The setting is inspired by the sculpture itself and the birch forests near Kusama’s childhood home.
Visitors can marvel at the bright, purple-tentacled floral form with a vivid yellow primordial face of I Want to Fly to the Universe in the Visitor Center Reflecting Pool, and then behold Ascension of Polka Dots on the Trees (2002/2021), where soaring trees adorned in vibrant red with white polka dots pop in the landscape along Garden Way.
Narcissus Garden (1966/2021), 1,400 stainless steel spheres each nearly 12 inches in diameter, is installed in the 230-foot-long water feature of the Native Plant Garden. The reflective orbs float on the water’s surface, moved by wind and currents, each mirroring the environment around them to captivating effect.
With interior access planned to begin this summer, Kusama’s new Infinity Mirrored Room will operate per New York State and City guidelines for social distancing and visitor safety. The installation, Infinity Mirrored Room Illusion Inside the Heart (2020), responds to natural light through colored glass throughout the day and seasons. Reflecting the seasonality of NYBGߣs landscape, the exterior will be on view with the opening of the exhibition. A separate timed-entry ticket will be required for limited-capacity access.
In the Galleries
In Flower Obsession, visitors may apply coral-colored floral stickers to the furniture and household objects. Over the course of the exhibition, the accumulating stickers will transform the greenhouse. Through works like this, Kusama employs the repeating patterns and forms of flowers to represent the concepts of obliteration, infinity, and eternity.
Three galleries in the Conservatory feature a horticultural celebration of Kusama’s self-proclaimed biophilia. My Soul Blooms Forever (2019), colossal polka-dotted flowers made of stainless steel and painted in dramatic colors, greet visitors under the recently restored dome of the Palms of the World Gallery.
In the Seasonal Exhibition Galleries, the pink-and-gold mosaic Starry Pumpkin (2015) is featured in a woodland garden of foliage and flowers chosen to harmonize with the sculpture’s pink polka dots. Using Kusama’s vibrant painting Alone, Buried in a Flower Garden (2014) as inspiration, NYBG horticulturists have designed a living work of art to mimic the painting’s bold shapes and colors, with plantings changed seasonally. The patchwork of shapes in the painting reads as garden beds seen from above.
In the Conservatory Courtyard Hardy Pool, the exuberantly colored and patterned sculpture Hymn of Life Tulips (2007) depicting outsized, fiberglass flowers are positioned among water lilies and other seasonal aquatic plantings. The Courtyard also features plantings including an array of tulips in spring and colorful annuals in summer that complement the dynamic sculpture on display.
Pumpkins Screaming About Love Beyond Infinity (2017) comprises a glass cube reflecting an infinity of glowing polka-dotted pumpkins within it. The work, one of Kusama’s signature mirrored environments, is installed in the Visitor Center Gallery. Viewed from the outside, the installation changes over time as pumpkins illuminate and then fade to darkness in a meditative choreography. Kusama has said of pumpkins, My pumpkins, beloved of all the plants in the world. When I see pumpkins, I cannot efface the joy of them being my everything, nor the awe I hold them in.
On display in the Library Building, Kusama’s 1945 sketchbook reveals the 16-year-old artist’s keen eye for detail in some 50 drawings capturing the bloom cycle of tree peonies. This work is an early product of a lifelong connection with the natural world that has inspired her practice across mediums. It also portends avant-garde ideas she developed while living in New York City between 1958 and 1973, as a contemporary of Joseph Cornell, Eva Hesse, Donald Judd, and Claes Oldenburg, and continues to explore rigorously today.
The Library Building presentation also features examples of her botanical drawings, works on paper, biomorphic collages, assemblage boxes, sculptures, and paintings on canvas depicting flora and its limitless variety of patterns.
Kusama’s considerable body of performance works is represented in the Ross Gallery by a projection of Walking Piece (ca. 1966/2021), a performance in which Kusama walked the streets of New York City wearing a bright-pink floral kimono and carrying an umbrella decorated with artificial flowers. Art historians have analyzed Walking Piece as a carefully calculated representation of the artist’s ethnicity and gender, one that was intended to demand attention.
From monumental polka-dotted pumpkin sculptures to abstract paintings that resemble cells magnified thousands of times, Kusama’s works suggest the patterns that can be observed all around us. The self-guided Patterns in Nature Tour, featured on the Bloomberg Connects mobile app, examines the visible and microscopic patterns found in nature. Visitors will discover what the patterns of leaf placement, flower petals, and magnified laboratory specimens reveal about what makes species unique as well as how all living things are connected at the genomic level.
Karen Daubmann, Vice President for Exhibitions and Audience Engagement at the Garden, said, “We are delighted to mount this very special exhibition this year, having postponed it in 2020 due to the pandemic. Yayoi Kusama kindly shared a message with us. On March 6, 2021, she wrote, in part, Dancing through our universe are noble souls whose magnificent forms are saturated with mystery. I invite you to explore the endlessly expanding ode to the beauty of love that is my art. We look forward to sharing her singular vision at the nexus of art, nature, and the cosmos at the Garden site uniquely suited for this once-in-a-lifetime presentation.
Programs and Publication
KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature is accompanied by a roster of public programs for all ages, including pop-up performances by musicians, jugglers, and puppeteers; self-guided Kids Get Cosmic; activities in the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden; and more. Signature exhibition merchandise is available for purchase at NYBG Shop.
Coming in summer 2021, a fully illustrated exhibition catalogue, co-published with Rizzoli Electa, will include essays by KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature guest curator Mika Yoshitake, art historian Jenni Sorkin, curator Alexandra Munroe, and other contributors, including curators and a scientist from NYBG. The publication will focus on Kusama’s lifelong engagement with nature and the ways her interest in nature and plants has formed her career-long investigation of themes of the cosmos and the interconnectedness of all living things. Images of works displayed in The New York Botanical Garden landscape will be featured.
Ticketing
Since reopening July 28, 2020, the Garden has incorporated safety measures based on best practices and guidelines from health authorities and government agencies. Admission to the Garden is currently available through the advance purchase of timed tickets. Visit the website for more information.
KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature has a new, limited, timed-entry ticketing system to stagger visitors arrivals and promote social distancing. Advance purchase of timed tickets is required and will be confirmed by e-mail with the option to print or download a mobile ticket.
The following options are available:
KUSAMA Garden & Gallery Pass includes access to all KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature outdoor installations across the grounds and access to the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, installations in the LuEsther T. Mertz Library Building and Ross Gallery, as well as interior access to Flower Obsession and Pumpkins Screaming About Love Beyond Infinity in the Visitor Center Gallery, plus the Tram Tour and Garden features including the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden and outdoor collections.
KUSAMA Garden Pass (Non-NYC Residents) includes access to all KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature outdoor installations across the grounds, plus Garden features including the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden and outdoor collections.
KUSAMA Garden Pass (NYC Residents) includes access to all KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature outdoor installations across the grounds, plus Garden features including the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden and outdoor collections.
A separate timed-entry ticket will be required to access the interior of Infinity Mirrored Room Illusion Inside the Heart. More information will be provided as it becomes available.
NYBG welcomes Bronx Health Care Heroes and Bronx Neighbors to KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature with complimentary tickets. Communities in the Bronx are among the most severely impacted by COVID-19 in New York City. Through these community access initiatives, the Garden seeks to acknowledge, with gratitude, the dedication, strength, and resilience of Bronx frontline health care workers and residents. Additional information about these initiatives is available at this website.
Visit NYBG for additional ticketing information and pricing and to sign up for e-mail alerts about the exhibition.
Exhibition on view April 10—October 31, 2021. Tickets available at nybg.org/kusama
Advance, timed tickets go on sale to the public on March 16 for The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) 2021 exhibition KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature, featuring work by internationally celebrated Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. NYBG is the exclusive venue for KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature. On view April 10 through October 31, 2021, the exhibition will be installed across the Garden’s 250-acre landscape, in and around the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, and in the LuEsther T. Mertz Library Building. Highlights include new works made especially for NYBG. Spectacular seasonal horticultural displays will complement the artworks and an array of programs and activities will make each visit unique. Pictured above, Hymn of Life-Tulips, 2007, will be displayed in the Conservatory Courtyard Hardy Pool.
Visit this website for additional ticketing information and information about NYBG’s offerings.
About The New York Botanical Garden
Founded in 1891, The New York Botanical Garden is the most comprehensive botanical garden in the world and an integral part of the cultural fabric of New York City, anchored in the Bronx. Visitors come to the Garden to connect with nature for joy, beauty, and respite, and for renowned plant-based exhibitions, music and dance, and poetry and lectures. Innovative children’s education programs promote environmental sustainability and nutrition awareness, graduate programs educate the next generation of botanists, while engaging classes inspire adults to remain lifelong learners. The 250-acre verdant landscape—which includes a 50-acre, old-growth forest—and the landmark Enid A. Haupt Conservatory support living collections of more than one million plants. Unparalleled resources are also held in the LuEsther T. Mertz Library, the world’s most important botanical and horticultural library with 11 million archival items spanning ten centuries, and William and Lynda Steere Herbarium, the largest in the Western Hemisphere with 7.8 million plant and fungal specimens. Committed to protecting the planet’s biodiversity and natural resources, Garden scientists work on-site in cutting-edge molecular labs and in areas worldwide where biodiversity is most at risk.
The New York Botanical Garden Announces Updates on Major Exhibition
KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature, Featuring New Work by Renowned Artist Yayoi Kusama
New block of advance, timed tickets and separate, limited-capacity tickets to Infinity Mirrored Room Illusion Inside the Heart for August 3–October 31 go on sale June 24
New richly illustrated catalogue documents landmark exhibition KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature on view exclusively at The New York Botanical Garden through October 31
The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) announces its release of a new block of timed tickets beginning on June 24 for admission to KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature from August 3 through October 31, 2021. The acclaimed exhibition features work by internationally celebrated Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, including four new sculptures and mirrored environments created especially for this presentation. The exhibition showcasing the artist’s lifelong fascination with the natural world is installed across the Botanical Garden’s landscape, in and around the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, and in the LuEsther T. Mertz Library Building and includes seasonal horticultural displays. NYBG is the exclusive venue for KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature, which is on view through October 31, 2021. Advance, timed, limited-capacity tickets for the landmark presentation are required and are on sale at this website.
The exterior of Kusama’s new Infinity Mirrored Room Illusion Inside the Heart (2020) has been on view since the opening of the exhibition, reflecting the seasonality of NYBG’s landscape. Interior access will begin on August 3, with separate limited-capacity tickets that will also go on sale on June 24. The immersive experience responds to varying natural light through colored glass throughout the day and seasons.
KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature Catalogue
The hardbound, 176-page catalogue, KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature–published by Rizzoli Electa in association with The New York Botanical Garden–features essays, little-known work by Yayoi Kusama, archival images, and installation photography. It will be available at NYBG Shop beginning June 15, 2021. Edited by the exhibition’s guest curator Mika Yoshitake and Joanna L. Groarke, Director of Public Engagement and Library Exhibitions Curator, NYBG, contributors include Barbara Ambrose, Director of Laboratory Research and Associate Curator of Plant Genomics, NYBG; Karen Daubmann, Vice President for Exhibitions and Audience Engagement, NYBG; Alex A. Jones, writer and independent scholar; Alexandra Munroe, Senior Curator, Asian Art, and Senior Advisor, Global Arts, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum; and Jenni Sorkin, Associate Professor, History of Art & Architecture, University of California, Santa Barbara.
La Grande Dame by Veuve Clicquot Partnership
NYBG announces its partnership with Veuve Clicquot, the French champagne house with which Yayoi Kusama has previously collaborated. In September 2020, Veuve Clicquot unveiled the results of their latest collaboration Kusama’s exceptional reinterpretation of the newly released La Grande Dame 2012 vintage champagne with her signature polka dot and floral motifs. The floral creation was reprised in My Heart That Blooms in The Darkness of The Night, a sculpture inspired by La Grande Dame champagne honoring Madame Clicquot, an industry visionary. Images of the collaboration are available here.
Following its presentation at NYBG’s annual Spring Gala on June 3, a large-scale version of My Heart That Blooms in The Darkness of The Night will be on view to diners in NYBG’s Hudson Garden Grill through the close of the exhibition on October 31. Veuve Clicquot’s La Grande Dame and Yellow Label champagne will be available for purchase.
“We are excited to offer special champagne and food pairings at the Hudson Garden Grill featuring Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame as part of the champagne house’s collaboration with Yayoi Kusama,”said Nelson Siavichay, Chef de Cuisine. “The vintage pairs beautifully with our farm-to-table cuisine and NYBG’s current exhibition showcasing works by Kusama.”
About The New York Botanical Garden
Founded in 1891, The New York Botanical Garden is the most comprehensive botanical garden in the world and an integral part of the cultural fabric of New York City, anchored in the Bronx. Visitors come to the Garden to connect with nature for joy, beauty, and respite, and for renowned plant-based exhibitions, music and dance, and poetry and lectures. Innovative children’s education programs promote environmental sustainability and nutrition awareness, graduate programs educate the next generation of botanists, while engaging classes inspire adults to remain lifelong learners. The 250-acre verdant landscape which includes a 50-acre, old-growth forest and the landmark Enid A. Haupt Conservatory support living collections of more than one million plants. Unparalleled resources are also held in the LuEsther T. Mertz Library, the world’s most important botanical and horticultural library with 11 million archival items spanning ten centuries, and William and Lynda Steere Herbarium, the largest in the Western Hemisphere with 7.8 million plant and fungal specimens. Committed to protecting the planet’s biodiversity and natural resources, Garden scientists work on-site in cutting-edge molecular labs and in areas worldwide where biodiversity is most at risk.
KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature is presented by:
Major Sponsors: Tom and Janet Montag; MetLife Foundation; and La Grande Dame by Veuve Clicquot
Generous support provided by: Citi and Delta Air Lines
Digital experience provided by: Bloomberg Philanthropies
Additional support provided by: E.H.A. Foundation, Inc.;
Arthur F. and Alice E. Adams Charitable Foundation; and the Japan Foundation
This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts; and
The New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature
Exhibitions in the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory are made possible by the Estate of Enid A. Haupt.
Exhibitions in the Arthur and Janet Ross Gallery are made possible by the Arthur and Janet Ross Fund.
LuESTHER T. MERTZ CHARITABLE TRUST:
Providing leadership support for year-round programming at NYBG
The New York Botanical Garden is located at 2900 Southern Boulevard, Bronx, New York 10458. For more information, visit this website. The New York Botanical Garden is located on property owned in full by the City of New York, and its operation is made possible in part by public funds provided through the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. A portion of the Garden’s general operating funds is provided by The New York City Council and The New York State Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation. The Bronx Borough President and Bronx elected representatives in the City Council and State Legislature provide leadership funding.
The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) has announced the dates for its expansive 2021 exhibition, KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature, featuring work by internationally celebrated Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. Postponed in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the exhibition will include four experiences that will debut at the Botanical Garden. NYBG is the exclusive venue for KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature. On view April 10 through October 31, 2021, the exhibition will be installed across the Garden’s landscape, in and around the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, and in the LuEsther T. Mertz Library Building. Advance, timed, limited-capacity tickets for the landmark presentation go on sale to the public March 16, 2021.
The exhibition, related programs, and accompanying publication will reveal Kusama’s lifelong fascination with the natural world and its countless manifestations, beginning in her childhood spent in the greenhouses and fields of her family’s seed nursery in Matsumoto, Japan. The exhibition will include works from throughout Kusama’s prolific career and multifaceted practice. By integrating seasonal horticultural displays, KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature will further illuminate the power of nature that pervades the artist’s practice and dynamic body of work.
Multiple outdoor installations will be on view, including monumental sculptures of flora that will transform the Garden’s 250-acre landscape and visitor experience. Her signature polka-dotted organic forms and mesmerizing paintings of plants and flowers will also be presented. These vivid observations of biodiversity will be shown along with archival material that has never been publicly exhibited, and more that will be on view for the first time in the United States.
Among the works created for and debuting in the exhibition are:
Dancing Pumpkin(2020), a monumental sculpture presented on the Haupt Conservatory Lawn;
I Want to Fly to the Universe(2020), a 13-foot-high biomorphic form presented in the Visitor Center; and
Infinity Mirrored Room–Illusion Inside the Heart(2020), an outdoor installation reflecting its environs.
Spectacular seasonal displays will complement the artworks on view, making each visit unique as new plantings, textures, and palettes are introduced. Glorious outdoor displays of tulips and irises in spring give way to dahlias and sweet peas in summer, and masses of pumpkins and autumnal flowers in fall. In and around the Conservatory, Kusama’s plant-inspired polka-dotted sculptures will be nestled among meadow grasses, bellflowers, water lilies, and other plantings. Stunning floral presentations will bring to life one of Kusama’s paintings on view in the Library Building through a seasonal progression of violas, salvias, zinnias, and other colorful annuals. In fall, displays of meticulously trained kiku (Japanese for chrysanthemum, one of that country’s most heralded fall-flowering plants) will create a dramatic finale for the Conservatory displays.
KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature guest curator Mika Yoshitake, Ph.D., said, “For Kusama, cosmic nature is a life force that integrates the terrestrial and celestial orders of the universe from both the micro- and macrocosmic perspectives she investigates in her practice. Her explorations evoke meanings that are both personal and universal. Nature is not only a central source of inspiration, but also integral to the visceral effects of Kusama’s artistic language in which organic growth and the proliferation of life are made ever-present.”
In the Garden
On the Conservatory Lawn, visitors will encounter the monumental Dancing Pumpkin, a 16-foot-high bronze sculpture in black and yellow. Both playful and powerful, it will be sited in an immersive landscape of river birches, flowering plants, grasses, and ferns. The setting is inspired by the sculpture itself and the plants native to Kusama’s childhood home.
Visitors can marvel at the bright, purple-tentacled floral form with a vivid yellow primordial face of I Want to Fly to the Universe in the Visitor Center Reflecting Pool, and then behold Ascension of Polka Dots on the Trees (2002/2021), where soaring trees adorned in vibrant red with white polka dots will pop in the landscape along Garden Way.
Narcissus Garden (1966/2021), 1,400 stainless steel spheres each nearly 12 inches in diameter, will be installed in the 230-foot-long water feature of the Native Plant Garden. The reflective spheres will float on the water’s surface, moved by wind and currents, each mirroring the environment around them to captivating effect.
The exterior of Infinity Mirrored Room–Illusion Inside the Heart, a cube-shaped structure with a reflective surface, will be on view, revealing and repeating the changing landscape throughout the seasons. Interior access to the installation, which responds to natural light through colored glass throughout the day, is planned to begin in summer, per New York State and New York City guidelines for COVID-19. A timed-entry ticket will be required for limited-capacity access.
In the Galleries
In Flower Obsession, visitors may opt to apply coral-colored floral stickers to the glass-paned walls and interior objects. Over the course of the exhibition, the stickers will transform the greenhouse. Through works like this, Kusama employs the repeating patterns and forms of flowers to represent the concepts of obliteration, infinity, and eternity.
Three galleries in the Conservatory will be transformed into a horticultural celebration of Kusama’s self-proclaimed biophilia. My Soul Blooms Forever(2019), colossal polka-dotted flowers made of stainless steel and painted in dramatic colors, will greet visitors under the newly restored dome of the Palms of the World Gallery.
In the Seasonal Exhibition Galleries, Starry Pumpkin (2015), adorned with pink and gold mosaic, will be featured in a woodland garden of foliage and flowers chosen to harmonize with the sculpture’s pink polka dots. Using Kusama’s vibrant painting Alone, Buried in a Flower Garden (2014) as inspiration, NYBG horticulturists have designed a living work of art to mimic the painting’s bold shapes and colors, with plantings that will change seasonally. The patchwork of shapes in the painting reads as garden beds seen from above.
In the Conservatory Courtyard Hardy Pool, the exuberantly colored and patterned sculpture Hymn of Life:Tulips (2007) featuring outsized, fiberglass flowers will be bordered by water lilies and other seasonal plantings. The buoyant flowers echo the stunning horticultural displays in the Conservatory.
Pumpkins Screaming About Love Beyond Infinity (2017) comprises a glass cube with two-way mirrors reflecting an infinity of glowing polka-dotted pumpkins within it. The work, one of Kusama’s signature mirrored environments, will be installed in the Visitor Center Gallery. Viewed from the outside, the installation is accompanied by a statement by the artist that reads, in part, “My pumpkins, beloved of all the plants in the world. When I see pumpkins, I cannot efface the joy of them being my everything, nor the awe I hold them in.”
On display in the Mertz Library Building, Kusama’s 1945 sketchbook reveals the 16-year-old artist’s keen eye for detail in some 50 drawings capturing the bloom cycle of tree peonies. This early work is the product of a lifelong connection with the natural world that has inspired her practice across mediums, and also portends the avant-garde ideas she developed while living in New York City between 1958 and 1973 as a contemporary of Joseph Cornell, Eva Hesse, Donald Judd, and Claes Oldenburg, and continues to explore rigorously today.
The Library Building presentation will feature examples of her botanical sketches, works on paper, biomorphic collages, assemblage boxes, and recent soft sculpture and paintings on canvas depicting flora and its limitless variety of patterns.
Kusama’s considerable body of performance works is represented in the exhibition by projected photographs of Walking Piece (ca. 1966), a performance in which Kusama walked the streets of New York wearing a bright-pink floral kimono and carrying an umbrella decorated with artificial flowers. Art historians have analyzed Walking Piece as a carefully calculated representation of the artist’s ethnicity and gender, one that was intended to demand attention. Interpretation will provide further context for the artist’s performance works.
From monumental polka-dotted pumpkin sculptures to abstract paintings that suggest cells magnified thousands of times, Kusama’s works suggest the patterns that can be observed all around us. In Patterns in Nature: Science Walk, a self-guided walking tour bringing together living plants and images of magnified laboratory specimens, visitors will explore the visible and microscopic patterns that can be found in nature, and how they reveal what makes species unique, as well as how all living things are connected at the genomic level.
Lauren Turchio, NYBG Vice President for Garden Experience, said, “When the exhibition had to be postponed last spring, Yayoi Kusama shared a moving message that read, in part: ‘The passion that I and those at The New York Botanical Garden have poured into this exhibition is still burning. Everyone, I hope you will wait.’ We are so grateful to our visitors for waiting for this once-in-a-lifetime presentation.”
Programs and Publication
KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature will be accompanied by a roster of public programs for all ages, including pop-up performances by musicians, jugglers, and puppeteers; self-guided “Kids Get Cosmic” activities in the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden; and more. Signature exhibition merchandise will be available for purchase at NYBG Shop.
Coming in summer 2021, a fully illustrated exhibition catalogue, co-published with Rizzoli Electa, will include essays by KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature guest curator Mika Yoshitake, art historian Jenni Sorkin, curator Alexandra Munroe, and NYBG curators and scientists that focus on Kusama’s lifelong engagement with nature and the ways in which her interest in nature and plants has formed her career-long investigation of themes of the cosmos and the interconnectedness of all living things. Images of works displayed at The New York Botanical Garden will be featured.
Ticketing
Since reopening July 28, 2020, the Garden has incorporated safety measures based on best practices and guidelines from health authorities and government agencies. Admission to the Garden is currently available through the advance purchase of timed tickets.
KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature tickets go on sale for NYBG Patrons beginning on March 9, 2021, Members on March 11, 2021, and the general public on March 16, 2021. The new, limited, timed-entry ticketing system staggers visitors’ arrivals and promotes social distancing. Advance purchase of timed tickets is required and will be confirmed by e-mail with the option to print or download a mobile ticket.
The following options will be available:
KUSAMA Garden & Gallery Passincludes access to all KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature outdoor installations across the grounds and access to the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, installations in the LuEsther T. Mertz Library Building and Ross Gallery, as well as interior access to Flower Obsession and Pumpkins Screaming About Love Beyond Infinity in the Visitor Center Gallery, plus the Tram Tour and Garden features including the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden and outdoor collections.
KUSAMA Garden Pass (Non-NYC Residents)includes access to all KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature outdoor installations across the grounds, plus Garden features including the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden and outdoor collections.
KUSAMA Garden Pass (NYC Residents) includes access to all KUSAMA: Cosmic Natureoutdoor installations across the grounds, plus Garden features including the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden and outdoor collections.
A timed-entry ticket will be required to access the interior of Infinity Mirrored Room–Illusion Inside the Heart. More information will be provided as it becomes available.
NYBG will welcome Bronx Health Care Heroes and Bronx Neighbors to KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature with complimentary tickets. Communities in the Bronx are among the most severely impacted by COVID-19 in New York City. Through these community access initiatives, the Garden seeks to acknowledge, with gratitude, the dedication, strength, and resilience of Bronx frontline health care workers and residents. Additional information about these initiatives will be available in the coming weeks.
About The New York Botanical Garden
Founded in 1891, The New York Botanical Garden is the most comprehensive botanical garden in the world and an integral part of the cultural fabric of New York City, anchored in the Bronx. Visitors come to the Garden to connect with nature for joy, beauty, and respite, and for renowned plant-based exhibitions, music and dance, and poetry and lectures. Innovative children’s education programs promote environmental sustainability and nutrition awareness, graduate programs educate the next generation of botanists, while engaging classes inspire adults to remain lifelong learners. The 250-acre verdant landscape, which includes a 50-acre, old-growth forest and the landmark Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, support living collections of more than one million plants. Unparalleled resources are also held in the LuEsther T. Mertz Library, the world’s most important botanical and horticultural library with 11 million archival items spanning ten centuries, and William and Lynda Steere Herbarium, the largest in the Western Hemisphere with 7.8 million plant and fungal specimens. Committed to protecting the planet’s biodiversity and natural resources, Garden scientists work on-site in cutting-edge molecular labs and in areas worldwide where biodiversity is most at risk.
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KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature is presented by:
Major Sponsors: Tom and Janet Montag and MetLife Foundation
Generous support provided by: Citi and Delta Air Lines
Digital experience provided by: Bloomberg Philanthropies
Additional support provided by: Arthur F. and Alice E. Adams Charitable Foundation
This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts; and The New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.
Exhibitions in the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory are made possible by the Estate of Enid A. Haupt.
LUESTHER T. MERTZ CHARITABLE TRUST: Providing leadership support for year-round programming at NYBG
The New York Botanical Garden is located at 2900 Southern Boulevard, Bronx, New York 10458. For more information, visit their website.
According to the research data analyzed and published by ForexSchoolOnline.com, Delta Air Lines’ revenue dropped by 88%. It led to a pre-tax loss of $7.01 billion and a GAAP net loss of $5.7 billion.
Passenger revenue plummeted by 94% to $678 million while cargo revenue dropped by 42% to $108 million. For H1 2020, there was a drop of 56% in operating revenue with passenger revenue shedding 60% YoY as it went from $20.62 billion to $8.25 billion. The total operating loss for H1 2020 was $8.37 billion and there was a loss per share of $9.83.
Global Air Travel Drops by 95%, Industry to Lose $84.3B in 2020
According to Flightradar 24, global daily commercial flights dropped from 100,000 to 23,923. In April 2020, there was a year-on-year (YoY) drop of 73.6% in commercial flights, slightly improving to -71.7% in May 2020.
Research from the International Air Transport Association (IATA) echoes a similar sentiment, noting a -95% drop YoY in global air travel in April 2020. It predicted that passenger numbers would halve to 2.25 billion compared to 2019. Similarly, passenger revenue would drop from $612 billion in 2019 to $241 billion in 2020. With airlines losing a cumulative $230 million daily, airlines would see a total loss of $84.3 billion. Asia Pacific will lead the industry’s losses with -$29.0 billion while North America will take the second spot with -$23.1 billion.
Booking, Entertainment, Airlines, Cruises/Casinos and Hotels/Resorts (BEACH) stocks are among the worst losers during the pandemic period. According to data from the Visual Capitalist, between February 19 and March 24, 2020, El Dorado Resorts was the highest loser. It lost 76% in market capitalization during the period while Norwegian Cruise Lines lost 72%. Overall, BEACH stock lost over $332 billion during this one-month period.
