Jeff Koons – ‘Art is a Vehicle of Acceptance’ | TateShots
This is a lobster that gets set up on a trash
can and a chair. It’s called Acrobat it balances itself. This is also aluminium. My name is Jeff Koons. I’m an artist. This studio is located in New York City. I’ve always had a little studio in my apartment or eventually I would have just a large building like this as a studio. I’ve been in this location for about the last eight years. Kind of the first thing you learn to do is create kind of a personal iconography or you develop a vocabulary to work with and that vocabulary lets you control physiology and the secretions that take place within the body. So there is a kind of a sense of power that comes from being able to create certain effects certain intellectual and physical reactions to work. This piece is Train and Train consists of a crane, a ready made crane and a steam engine, a 1943 Baldwin steam engine 70 feet long. You walk right underneath this It’s going to be in front of a museum so when the museum opens at noon-time and then when the museum closes and the piece will do everything that a real train does. When I was younger, art was a vehicle that created anxiety and, you know, whether you could draw something just perfect or it’s about performance, in a way and you start to understand about the history of art other artists, their involvement with art how it connects you to other disciplines in the world and this starts to erode away at the insecurities and anxieties that you have. When we work on smaller domestic size pieces, they will be cast in up-state New York in aluminium. We will bring them here and we will do the rest of the metalwork here on site and then we prime them. This has just been primed. Actually this is a base coat of paint. This piece has been primed, and now we’re going back. We always get different over-spray each time we paint or prime something and we have to work the surface to get everything correct to go on to the next stage. What art is able to do is, it’s about acceptance and people talk about aesthetics and all these different things but at the end of the day what art really is, is a vehicle of acceptance. First you accept yourself, and eventually the highest state is the acceptance of others. You know, usually a painting maybe will be a year and a half. I would say on average a painting is about nine months to a year but sometimes a painting will be here a year and a half. Some of these paintings I’ve worked on, I’ve put in storage, then I’ve brought back out to finish the work on and if you look at Popeye here in the front, he’s here very virile and making, showing his muscles but if you look in the background there’s
also this ghostlike figure of Popeye floating up off the picture plain in the back. My relationship with art is changed every day and every day you wake up, your relationship is a little different with it. When I was very young, I kind of got a sense of self through art. My parents let me know that I could do something and I was proud of that and I just started to trust in this activity and it gave me a sense of who I am.
@JohnWhitesideParsons MAKE ME COOL I AM A SHITTING GOD
I will always like Jeff Koons.
There we have it people, mr Koons has found the meaning of art!
"A vehicle of acceptance."
Why on earth have people been debating this topic for so long when they could have simply asked Jeff Koons? Jeez…
He's no artist. Any person who has self-respect shouldn't work for him.
@Estragon17 just because he talks slow and gentle? get real.
lol why all the hating? Im sure he wouldnt give two shits what anyone thinks, i would definately like to see his bank account, and most of his work I think is really good.
BULLSHIT ARTIST.
Ever seen this bozo's "drawings" for his pieces? They're all crude and dimensionless, like the stuff you see hanging in a kindergarten classroom. He should have become a critic or art historian and remained far away from the studio. His success is the result of hype, self promotion and clueless collectors who think Warhol was being serious. Take a look at the art collected and purchased by the artists themselves. Warhol's apt was filled with paintings and drawings by Renaissance artists.
@helloterrible Agreed, but this guy has no actual art making skills. He simply has ideas (often derivative) that are realized by skilled laborers. The contemporary art world seems to be the only arena in which a person with absolutely no skill can be heralded as a genius. I don't know any professional musicians who can't recognize simple notes in a scale or chord progressions. However, I know dozens of professional artists who can't even execute their own ideas on paper in the form of a diagram
youtube.com/watch?v=Gx1O9YNI24E
The original Mr. Brainwash.
That's not an artist; that's a CEO.
The difference is that Warhol and co. knew the kind of chaotic culture they were creating (or promoting…ironically or not). They were clearly aware of the bubble they lived in. I get the impression that Koons is just totally unaware of everything around him.
This train piece infuriates me. The LACMA pitched tens of millions of dollars (I cant remember, it was either 10 or 40 mill) to buy/install the piece. And for what? The public either doesnt understand it, or hates it.
Can you imagine what all the young, aspiring artists struggling in this economy could have done with some of that money? All the great, new art that could be made if LACMA invested that 10 million into a generation who actually needs the money?
These institutions are clueless.
Koons has a history with LACMA director. Deitch helped him out in years past with those gawd awful chrome "balloon" sculptures. It is no surprise the two have buddied up again…more than anything these works point to the nauseating politics behind major American art institutions
I have seen some of Koon's work in person and I find them mesmerising.
CatZula, are you still here talking about this? It's been like two years now. Jesus Christ, if slamming Jeff Koons is the biggest priority in your life, you need to get a new one. You're just some douche who's butthurt over the way a certain artist makes his work. Jeff Koons couldn't give a shit if you don't like his methods, and neither do I. I enjoy his work. Maybe if you weren't such an asshole, people would listen to you. If you love hand-made work, stick to other artists and STFU already.
He should have a big sign on his studio… "Welcome to the Money Factory"
his face is fucking weird
Jeff, you're not an artist, you're a fucking plant manager. I see the picture of Lawrence Weiner to my right here, I wonder if he thinks Jeff Koons is an artist?
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I'm a bit apprehensive of those artists who pay others to employ "their" specific ideas and subsequently claim them as their own.
.
a creative, competent and intelligent man, that can bring his art to fruition.
I wonder how much of his narcissism is for the cameras.
This is minimising the impact he has on the culture. An artist who has been working at his or her own art for years, will understand what one needs to go through to get to true freedom of expression. He is inspiring, at least for the ones that really understand what this is about.
People use art and culture to nurture their humanity.
I truly believe and have good reason to believe that it is an inside trading secret society kind of deal. Not sure about this case in particular but high art in general. Or in other words, expensive art.
Koons isn't an artist, he just a salesman.
So telling, Mr. Koons spends the whole video talking about making his art, while other people are in the background actually making it.
strip mall of the art world.
people actually buy this garbage?
all this guy does is take other peoples' images and mash them together. uncreative, unoriginal and talentless. how does he not get sued by these properties?
He does turn out a very high quality product and that you can't deny.
As far as him not doing the work you must be unfamiliar with art history as many famous artists use helpers who did everything from mix paint or carve the rough fiqure of a sculpture especially if they do large works or have many projects going.
An example would be the sculptor who did the Statue of Liberty of course he was not going to do all the work himself.
Hilarious
Go APU lolz
I love him being a perfectionist, his works are impeccable sublime. Perfect reflections, inapprehansible amenity, perfect illusion.
Would like to have him pay a visit to our studio. 🙂
He's a hack, and if my father bankrolled my 'visions'. If I 'tell you' what I envision, then you do the drawings, and those drawings go into a factory and the factory makes the work. Then ships it back to me, I put it on a pedestal and say…"I am an artist, this is MY art?" "Speak softly and carry a big check book" He is an idiot magnet, and I suppose I should be grateful, that he pools a certain…mmm, dare I say..eliminate in the art world. I am grateful for the removal of these art-sheep. He knows it's a shame, he's demeanor is a shame, it's all thought out and part of his act. But go ahead, and line up and eew and ahh at super sized, 99cent store toys.
Koons industrial fabric
something sinister behind that gigantic smile
I had the distinct pleasure of seeing Mr. Koons give a talk at MICA while I was studying there… It was just amazing watching the mindless sputum dribbling out of his mouth as he attempted to discuss his work… and then the deer-in-headlights look on his face when the students began tearing him apart with questions about his work and the bullshit he stands for.
I bet everyone of those artists who work for him absolutely hate him, but hey, they need the money because they don't kiss ass like Jeff Koons does.
Oooooooooooh Shit! I'm outta of here.
He is nothing but an x wall st idiot who has crews of real artists do his work for him…please! overblown his work is…he thinks himself an IDEA man, he is not an artist, atleast Warhol was an innovator and graphic designer and then..a real fine artist that helped create a new form of art, not this copycat fraud……….
The workers perform similar tasks to a factory worker, and are most likely getting more pay. Personally I think it's really interesting to see what an artist (especially of Koons calibre) can do with practically unlimited money.
He's an usurper, galleries that exhibit his work should be boycotted
stupid no artist no art. only speculation and marketing
fuck its unreal how telling modern art is about society, the farther technology has taken us the more and more detached from reality weve become, people applying meaning to aluminium inflatables balancing on trashcans?!?!?!?!?!? WHYYYYYYYY fuck you contemporary art, fuck you
who this? and why is he in Tate? I tought you have to be artist to exibit in Tate…
'Koons is a vehicle of B.S.'
He is just a businessman, with slaves under his feet. he don't want coworkers or helpers for HIS work, he want painters and slaves.
"the iconography helps to ..control the secretions of the body", Hope this guy doesnt work anywhere near kids. "Insecurities and anxieties may erode away" with the creepy Mr. Rogers routine. I'm not accepting it.
Consumeristic Capitalistic Art, more like a vehicle of generating money.
Hopefully jeff koons is standing underneath the train when the cable snaps.
https://youtu.be/-nl0dX3tf84
Some Interesting Art There
this guy is an artist a con artist
he doesnt even do anything but boss ppl around he's not an artist, he's a manager, the real artists are the assistants
The "we" is never "we", Jeff koon is so overestimate.
LUNDI 25 SEPTEMBRE 2017 – MONSIEUR MARCEL DUCHAMP – DADA – POP – RICHARD HAMILTON – ANDY WARHOL – ROY LICHTENSTEIN – ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG – RICHARD PRINCE – CLAES OLDENBURG – DONALD JUDD – JOSEPH KOSUTH – DANIEL BUREN – GUNTHER VON HAGENS – DAMIEN HIRST – JEFF KOONS
You know jeff, i used to hate you. Like a lot. I would talk all kinds of shit about you. But really jeff, i understand you now. I get it! For so long I thought that art was a meaningful pursuit and something iwanted to do. But i can't. Like you said, all there is is the performance of being an artist. Thats it. There is no honesty, no sincerity, no fun. at all. It doesn't give me a catharsis, or a sense of purpose. It is truly a failed pursuit. Shit, I can't even feel excited knowing that no matter how hard i try, all art can ever be is a great social media moment. Find me on social media by the way, I want to friend you on facebook, and i have tried to contact you on twitter but you blocked me. DIck. Sorry. I just want to understand how you can keep going. Really jeff, I losing it. What is the point? Why make art? Why do anything JEff? I can't just move to new york, marry a pornstar and be happy. Contact me when you can. I hope you can help.
NEO RAUCH is a clear example of a true artist!!! Not this jerk
Love this video. Also love all the haters. Why tf does this guy bother you so much? No really, trace back your questions and realize the source of it all.
What a fucking clown hack honestly
This guy is a tax write off
Utter bs. Money laundering scam
Mr. KOON I am admire of your art. People like you make life richer thanks for all your work
for as succesful as he is at least he should make his own pieces
He's not a real artist. He's a real crook. The man was rich in selling garbage.
everyone talking shit about him seem to care more about drawing than art. i don't like his shit either but you're all a bunch of boring conformist art student jocks if you think the act is more important than the idea.
It is astounding that such a giant of the artworld can so disconnected with the society in which he lives and thrives so very well. It seems very wrong that someone so handsoff, irrelevant, vacuous and inarticulate has been allowed to rise to such heights. Shame on the art establishment.
This is not art
He doesn't even make them with his own hands. He's the DJ Khaled of Art.
No. No, No