Jeff Koons, the name conjures it all. You envision colorful kitsch in a
grandiosity of scale that takes fanciful thoughts executed with a precise
perfection. It’s such a boring
idea to dislike Koons, or to try to have a conversation of what he means or
reflects in the state of art because he is already built into the art books,
(minor as that signification truly is), but nonetheless he is ordained. Koons has been doing his brand of art
for over thirty years and his impact, although not enough to garner an “ism”,
has had seismic effect in the visual arts. Currently, there are two fantastic shows on Koons and his
legacy at two locations in Frankfurt Germany. One focuses on his paintings and is at the Schrin Kunsthalle
and the other focuses on his sculptures at the Liegieghaus Skulturensammlung. They are respectively entitled JEFF
KOONS. THE PAINTER and JEFF KOONS.
THE SCULPTOR. If there was ever a title(s) to encapsulate the ego, these are
it. Regardless of the title, these
shows are very good, one more then the other, but nonetheless, they evidence an
artistic practice, evolution and thought that is beyond just impressive
production. They show an
accessible intelligence and also the impossible yet persisting relevance of
visuality.
The Shrin Kunsthalle is a more typical exhibition space that
presents the painting portion of this two-show affair. It is modern and white and has the
lighting and static air that makes anything within radiate seriousness and
importance by merely being fastened to the wall. The space has a feeling of a long corridor. You enter at the middle of the space
and at the beginning of Koons’ investigations into consumable goods and
pop-culture images. The painting
component, as well as the sculptural, picks from his various series executed
over the years such as, “Celebration,” “EasyFun-Ethereal,” “Made in Heaven,”
“Luxury and Degradation” etc. (all are graciously viewable on the artist’s
website). There is a concise
sampling of all of his series that must be credited to the exhibition’s
curators, Vinzenz Brinkmann, Matthias Ulrich, and Joachim Pissarro. Kudos!
Paintings always reveal the human touch and although this
also holds true for Koons, he gets damn close to erasing this. This quest to devoid painting of
expressive gesture is fascinating in its execution. The subject matter used to achieve this are things like,
consumer products, cartoons, porn, fashion, advertisements, and a slew of other
materialized vices that makes the paintings visual confection. There is an activated familiarity with
using these types of images that makes what’s happening with them, to them even
more befuddling. There are two
particular works from his “EasyFun/Easy Ethereal” series that were gems to see,
Bagel from 2002 and Lips from 2000.
Here collage and the cut-up are oddly familiar in both past use ways
like that of Cubism, Surrealism and Pop Art and also in now/future ways like
digital paintings and 3D interiors and imagined virtual spaces. These two works in particular
also touch on a general vulgarity that permeates all of Koons’ works, most
especially his paintings. There is
the more direct evidence of this as in of his “Made in Heaven” series which
predominantly features him and his ex-wife, Cicciolina, having sex and
exploring orifices. These works
gets to the point quickly but there is also this other use of parts of the body,
usually female, that has a bizarre charge of sexual obsession, dislocation or
to be frank a juvenile focus. It
is sexual but not sexy. There is a
distanced gaze and perversion of sensation that can be blinked away as awkward
pubescent unknowing.
The sex issues can go one for chapters but back to the
show. The works are like measuring
tapes of various techniques, images and themes that seem to have peeked a
curiosity with Koons and with each successive year the compositions and the way
in which they are executed become more and more complex. It’s like watching a video of a child
go from toddler to highschooler, fascinating, awkward, and easy to
believe. Newer paintings from his
“Popeye” series are just mind-boggling in their flatness and his use of
cartoons and child toys abound through this series as well as others. These cartoons should conjure an
easy-breezy-mass-appeal feeling, but seeing them all together there is
something very off, even possibly sad.
Some of the more seductive works are newer works are from
his “Antiquity” series, such as Antiquity Dots 2, 2009-2012 which has a Betty
Page-esque women straddling an inflatable dolphin and she is about to kiss an
inflatable money. The backsplash
of bindi dots, the child marker doodle overlay and the stone figures from
antiquity, one with a massive erection, makes this painting so “now” it is
oddly grimacing. The digital-ness
of the collage is also so obvious and seemingly so meaningless but it is this
digital touch that makes all the difference. The mechanical annihilation of the painter is in full effect
here. Truly, the only way these
newer works reveal themselves as oil on canvas is getting nose close to the
surface and seeing the canvas’ tooth.
Next, down the way towards the river and to the Liebieghaus
Skulpturensammlung which hosts the
sculptural portion of the show. It
is here that things get very interesting.
The Liebierghaus is the type of building you think about when you think
“Europe” in an old fashioned way.
It was built in 1909 and is houses works spanning 5,000 years from
Ancient Egypt to Neoclassism. It
is stone and marble and wood and dim.
For this show, sculptural works by Koons, forty-four precisely, spanning
30 or so years are interspersed through the permanent collection of rare and
ancient artifacts and works of art.
Such an ego-maniacal thing to do right?! Well yes, but no.
There is a startling bravado to this act, placing his Ushering in
Banality, 1988, which is made of ghastly colored polychrome wood and has
cherubs and a boy pushing along a pig with a green bow next to relics and
crosses and crying Virgin Marys from thousands of years ago, is just audacious
but also a moment of ah-ha. The
act of considering oneself as equal, as rare, as historical as these more
ancient artifacts is appalling, downright tacky really, but the more one goes
through the exhibition, it weirdly makes sense. Koons' work does not gain in signification due to the context
but it being installed there together makes all of it, the old and the new
equal in their significance and nothingness.
There are some pieces that work better then others, the
polychrome wood sculptures that have a folk twist are just not interesting and
the plastic porcelain pieces have always felt off like Pink Panther, 1988 but
there are others that are so fantastic and possess this feeling of belonging
such as Rabbit, 1986, Wishing Well, 1988 and even the more cartoon works like
Titi Tire, 2003 which has inflatable Tweety birds made of aluminum and a rubber
car tire in one of the top floor’s octagonal rooms that house rare books and
artifacts. It’s funny, absurd, but seems just fine.
Some of the most successful selections were the new metal
works from his “Antiquity” series and the Hulk sculptures from his “Hulk Elvis”
series. One of the new “Antiquity” works utilizes Koons’ signature use of
balloon animal/forms, this one entitled Balloon Venus, 2008-2012, that is a
massive, eight and a half feet in height, and is a metallic fuchsia, Zen posing
balloon women reminiscent of the Venus of Willendorf and other archeologically
excavated female carvings. There
is a bulbous fertility in the form that was clearly modeled from a latex
balloon. The placement of this
work and all of its symbolic references conjures timelessness. The other work from this series,
Metallic Venus, 2010-2012, is super wow.
It was in one of the building’s alcoves with walls painted bright red
and had bright overhead lighting.
It is a metallic aqua blue of a self-revealing woman whose head is tilted
back till the point of dissolving its form and a draped plinth next to her with
a vase with live flowers. The
material of this sculpture and of Balloon Venus is “high chromium stainless
steel with transparent color coating” and it is this material and the way it is
used that make these works in particular seem like the future. The liquidity of the material, the
smoothness and the way the surface reflects and bounced light and mirrors is
like nothing seen before. There is
a lightness in these that are quoted in the earlier metal works like in Rabbit but
here it is taken to a very different place of actualization and feeling.
In the “Hulk Elvis” series’, Hulk Friends, 2004-2012 and
Hulks (Bell), 2004-2012, also show this next phase of material realization. Both Hulk sculptures use inflatable(s)
of that character in the scale that it could originally be purchased at a toy
store. The Hulk Friends is located
at the bottom of the stairs and it is like this odd sentient waiting for you to
enter. On his shoulder, he has a crew of smaller cute critters that look like
an aural entourage. Both the Hulk
and his pals look like inflatable plastic toys. They look like they are filled with air and their little
plugs look like you can pop them open and let all that air out. There are crinkles on the Hulk’s purple
pants that are from being pressed into a box before inflation. It all looks so like what you think it
is. But of course it isn’t plastic
and air, instead it is polychromed bronze and probably weighs a gagillion
pounds. This is also true for
Hulks (Bells), which are also unbelievable in their illusions. In this case the context of being in a
room with art from Asia that show demons, Buddhas, Vishnu’s and yogi’s makes it
all seem very interchangeable. It is
here that the sense of connection and belonging really hits home. There is a reason why the Hulk is the
Hulk, he wasn’t created from nothing, he is another character, another embodied
symbol that is as significant and insignificant as any other interpretation of
character or tool to tell a tale.
The show being in Frankfurt Germany and at these
institutions assists in the subtly of what it means to paint, what it means to
sculpt, and the relevancies and historical arc of making pictures and objects
to reflect a time. In these shows
and throughout his career, Koons seems to make an unapologetic claim to
significance that is too brilliant and ballsy to disqualify. His work in singulars are many
times flawed, dull and regurgitative but there are moments, very clear moments,
when they get to the place it was meant to go. There seems to be something distinct happening in Koons’
atelier in 2012 that is changing the game in how material can be pushed, not in
the conversation of “materiality” but getting to an alchemically transformative
zone. It’s going to blow our minds
for sure. Some think Koons is a
one trick pony. Sure there is a
besmirched mischievous twinkling gleam in his eyes when it comes to his art but
there is much more then one trick up his sleeve. He’s more like Santa Claus and he makes magic toys for the
art world and we are all greedy-greedy children.