I stepped into the gallery last Thursday not expecting to be undone by color. But there it was—Yayoi Kusama's Infinity Mirrored Room, a universe folding into itself, lit by countless points of light that stretched beyond comprehension. I'd seen photographs, of course. Everyone has. But photographs lie by omission. They can't capture what it feels like to stand suspended in eternal space, your own reflection multiplied into forever.
The room holds you for ninety seconds. That's all. Ninety seconds to become infinite, to dissolve into light and return. I watched my silhouette fragment and repeat, stretched across mirrors that refused to acknowledge edges or endings. The LED lights shifted through purples, deep blues, brilliant whites—each color creating its own emotional atmosphere. Purple felt contemplative, almost sacred. Blue was longing. White was pure wonder.
What Kusama understands, what she's always understood, is that infinity isn't just a mathematical concept. It's a feeling. It's standing in a small room that becomes the entire cosmos. It's seeing yourself everywhere and nowhere simultaneously. It's the vertigo of recognizing how small you are and how vast existence is, all while remaining completely, vulnerably human.