DANIEL LEAL/AFP
She is the world's most famous unknown artist, everyone knows her name, but no one knows what she does, John Lennon once said of the perceived disregard for his wife Yoko Ono, who turns 91 on Sunday.
From Thursday, Ono's impact on conceptual art will be on display in a retrospective exhibition at the Tate Modern in London.
The "Music of the Mind" show, which runs until September 1, explores the multi-disciplinary works of a woman more famed for being the murdered Beatle's wife than a conceptual art icon.
"This exhibition is a true celebration of Yoko as an artist," one of the exhibition's curators, Andrew de Brun told AFP.
"Indeed, John Lennon was a very important collaborator for her, but we are very happy to be able to showcase her art."
Two hundred works
Spanning seven decades, the exhibition presents a detailed exploration of Ono's artistic legacy through 200 pieces, including installations, objects, videos, photographs, sculptures and documents detailing her performances and musical compositions.
Since her initial exhibitions in New York during the 1950s, Ono has been a proponent of conceptualism, an art movement that posits the concept or idea behind an artwork is more important than the physical piece.
The exhibition examines some of the artist's most controversial works or performances, such as the video of "Cut Piece", a work she first presented in Japan and then in 1965 at Carnegie Recital Hall in New York.
On stage, Ono appeared in a black dress and left scissors beside her, allowing the audience to cut off her clothing in an exhibit aimed at drawing attention to the violence society inflicts on women.
The exhibition appears as a vindication of the artist's epic journey, after decades of being blamed by some for the breakup of The Beatles in 1970.
Some art features in the forthcoming exhibition 'Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind' at Tate Modern in London.
