What Is The Distinction Between Art And Attraction?

From Yayoi Kusama’s tate modern shows to the recently opened superblue in Miami, overwhelmingly sensory experiences have swept social media by storm. But what is the distinction between art and attraction?

- Kat Herriman

When the Tate Modern opened its 2012 Yayoi Kusama retrospective, the curators probably knew it would be big. It was, after all, the first major European survey of a groundbreaking conceptual artist. What they couldn’t have predicted was the global frenzy that one of the works – “Infinity Room,” a barber shop of mirrors infinitely lit with fairy lights – would ignite. Nearly a decade later, Katy Wan, the curator behind Kusama’s two new iterations of “Infinity Room” opening at the British museum this summer, admits that the revival exhibitions’ purpose is twofold: to provide access to visitors chomping at the bit to experience the artist’s now widely-snapped installations for themselves as well as provide a moment of pause to “reassess Kusama in light of her rise to global acclaim, helped in recent years by the rise of social media.”

It was, however, the ubiquity of social media that brought the Museum of Modern Art’s 2013 iteration of artists Hannes Koch and Florian Ortkrass’ “Rain Room” to the attention of masses. Who could miss supermodel Karlie Kloss strategically backlit in a white skirt? Her caption of choice documenting her visit: “no umbrella needed #RainRoom.” Of course, the only place one might have wanted one was in the queue that wound around the block for weeks. Surely Karlie didn’t have to wait like the rest of us.