Jeff Koons Exhibition

My second gallery exhibition I decided to visit was the Jeff Koon exhibition in Vauxhall. The exhibition was very simplistic, the layout was simple but quite refreshing, made me feel very relaxed. 3 enormous sculptures which created this unique feeling of swapping realism/sizes; comparison of the different when holding the object snd the object being the subject to be larger in comparison.

‘Now’ was the first major UK exhibition to be devoted to the artist since ‘Jeff Koons: Popeye Series’, at the Serpentine Gallery in 2009. Spanning thirty-five years of the artist’s extraordinary career, ‘Now’ featured over thirty paintings, works on paper and sculptures dating from 1979 to 2014. Drawn from Hirst’s collection, a number of the works had never before been shown in the UK.

Having begun his career focusing on the status of the object, ‘Now’ demonstrated how Koon's quickly embarked on his lifelong investigation into the means by which objects are represented and communicated. With his sculptures cast in stainless steel, he returned to the inflatable; seductively replicating pre-existing objects in the gleaming, simulated opulence of the proletarian material. Employing cutting-edge technology, seemingly fragile, air-filled vinyl blow-ups and balloon animals are reproduced in stainless steel, sometimes rendered on the monumental scale of Balloon Monkey (Blue) (2006–2013), which was exhibited in Newport Street’s double-height gallery. The reflective surfaces of these sculptures serve to “constantly remind viewers of their existence”, as Koon's maintains, “it’s all about you”.

Koons’s enduring ability to delight, fascinate and provoke is evident throughout this broad survey. Employing easily-identified images, he explores social mobility in the Equilibrium Nike posters, the ways alcohol is advertised to different demographics in Luxury and Degradation, and the evocative imagery of childhood toys represented in Celebration. Whilst with his Made in Heaven series – erotic scenes involving the artist and his then-wife Ilona Staller (aka ‘La Cicciolina’) – he investigates the stigma and shame that inheres in contemporary conceptions of sexuality, succeeding in transforming the erotic into a study of: “the biological eternal… the preservation of life, the continuation of life”.