Note: This is needing editing. A lot of editing. Its a work in progress and will be refined.
I have long struggled with Koons. I’m not alone. I feel that every other person I have ever talked about Koons with also questions his validity.
I’ve put a lot of thought into what it means to be the artist Jeff Koons. I want to understand his motivation and why some people really like his work a lot. Over the decades that I have been mulling this question over, my opinion of and admiration of Koons has waxed and waned.
While I have little respect for most of what Koons has produced, I do respect him from a capitalist perspective. I admire how Koons uses money.
I think there are two classes of money.
The vast majority of people deal with money as a means of sustenance. I have spent and probably will spend my life making an effort to earn enough to live off of. I have made enough to invest in 401k’s and that money is in turn used to make more by money managers. The money managers are on the hook to get the biggest return possible for their clients so they invest in companies that are focused on money making. This is a soulless circle and we end up with these huge corporate behemouths that are maybe not doing what is in the public’s best interest because they are focused on making share holders money.
There is another way money can be used. Some people who have acquired enough money use it that turns capitalism into an art form. Where the intent is not profit, profit is nice, but the focus is instead on executing an idea. (find a non-musk example) Elon Musk made enough on the sale of Paypal to sit back and enjoy the rest of his life however he saw fit. Instead he pushed his money back into his dreams and created SpaceX and Tesla. Larry Gagosian became a billionaire by reinvesting in his vision. I think Musk and Gagosian would have been sad if they went broke, but they took gambles on their own personal vision, executed on the vision well, and succeeded in creating something new. You don’t have to like Musk or Gagosian to appreciate how they started with nothing and willed huge empires into existence.
I don’t think most people get the chance to experience #2. And, from my observations, most people that have the money to support a #2 enterprise, don’t do so because they aren’t motivated to do so.
My thinking is that Koons has managed to create a system, a commercial structure that works and churns out art in a way that is an art form unto itself.
—- this all needs re-writing.
Koons has made some really bad art, that also sells for a LOT of money. So there are collectors who love this guy. There are also collectors who love Damien Hirst, so this is almost a meaningless observation.
