It’s not often an unfinished building is the centerpiece of a major event, but Factory International, which stages the Manchester International Festival (MIF) every other year, is using its future home, designed by OMA and set to open in October, as just that. The festival, which commenced on June 29 and runs through July 16, has engaged a number of artists from around the world to create works spread throughout the English city, but inside Aviva Studios—as OMA’s building is now called—ubiquitous nonagenarian Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama has staged the largest-ever installation of her inflatables. Within the vast 70-foot-high “warehouse” of the visual and performing arts venue, Kusama’s You, Me and the Balloons features towering dolls and pumpkins, balls suspended from the ceiling, and what appear to be octopus arms emerging from the ground, all covered in the artist’s signature polka dots.

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