Museum's Display of Glowing Pumpkins Reopens After Visitor Trips, Wrecks Fiberglass Gourd

Museum's Display of Glowing Pumpkins Reopens After Visitor Trips, Wrecks Fiberglass Gourd

A mirror-filled room full of glowing fiberglass pumpkins reopened to the public on Tuesday after a visitor destroyed one of the sculptures in what several news reports described as a selfie-attempt gone wrong.
The Hirshhorn Museum in Washington D.C.’s “Infinity Mirrors” exhibition features mirrored rooms with intricate displays created by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. It opened last Friday and the incident involving the smashed pumpkin happened over the weekend, less than a week after opening.

The room was reopened after rearranging the pumpkins with the help of the artist for the reconfiguration. A replacement pumpkin is set to arrive in a few weeks.

The room, “All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins” was part of six rooms that feature immersive displays of repeating patterns and seemingly endless mirrors. Visitors step into five of the rooms and the door is closed for the full experience. A sixth room features a small window for visitors to peer into and look at the design.

According to museum, the incident was an accident and no charges were filed. A spokesperson couldn’t confirm whether the visitor was engaging in the act of taking a selfie.

If you visited the museum in the last few days and were sad about missing the room full of pumpkins, you can check it out in 360-degrees from the New York Times right here:

[via New York Times, photo by Ron Cogswell]

Wasim Ahmad's picture

Wasim Ahmad is an assistant teaching professor teaching journalism at Quinnipiac University. He's worked at newspapers in Minnesota, Florida and upstate New York, and has previously taught multimedia journalism at Stony Brook University and Syracuse University. He's also worked as a technical specialist at Canon USA for Still/Cinema EOS cameras.

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