Jeff Koons

Giancarlo Politi, 'Interview', in: Flash Art, February-March 1987, p. 74, illustration of another example
Miriam Horn, 'The Avant-Garde', in: U.S. News and World Report, May 1987, pp. 68-69, illustration of another example
Norbert Messler, 'Paul Maenz', in: Galeries Magazine, December 1987, pp. 102-109, illustration of another example
Exhibition Catalogue, Pittsburgh, The Carnegie Museum of Art, 1988, Carnegie International, p. 91, illustration of another example in colour
Veit Loers, 'Interview with Jeff Koons', in: Schalf der Vernuft, February 1988, pp. 111-115, illustration of another example
Zdenek Felix, 'Jeff Koons', in: New York in View, February 1988, n.p, illustration of another example
'Schamlos Schon', in: Der Spiegel, February 1988, pp. 228-231
Lynne Warren,'Post-Conceptualism', in: Three Decades, December 1989, p. 80, illustration of another example
Exhibition Catalogue, Newport, Newport Harbor Art Museum, Objectives: The New Sculpture, 1990, n.p, illustration of another example in colour
'The Subject is Objects', in: Orange Coast Weekend, April 1990, p. 16, illustration of another example
Sabeth Buchmann, 'New York New York', in: Vogue, April 1990, pp. 266-271, illustration of another example in colour
Peter Schjedahl, 'Jeff Koons', in: Objectives, May 1990, pp. 82-99, illustration of another example in colour
Michael Vaupel, 'Bis sich der Kopf dreht', in: Ruhr-Anzeiger Waz, Velberter Zeitung und Westdeutsche Allgemeine, October 1991, p. 1, illustration of another example
Anthony d'Offay, Ed., The Jeff Koons, London 1992, p. 159, illustration of another example in colour
Exhibition Catalogue, San Francisco, San Francisco Museum of Art, Jeff Koons, 1992, no. 33, illustration of another example
Angelika Muthesius, Ed., Jeff Koons, Cologne 1992, no. 6, p. 90, illustration of another example
Exhibition Catalogue, Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, Jeff Koons, 1992, no. 33, illustration of another example in colour
Lara Morell, 'Jeff Koons Interview: The Political Value of Art', in: Skala, June 1993, pp. 38-42, illustration of another example
Bice Curiger, 'Niko Pirosmani and Contemporary Art', in: Signos and Milagros, pp. 44-45, illustration of another example
Exhibition Catalogue, Berlin, Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin, Easyfun-Etheral, 2000-2001, p. 35, fig. 17, illustration of another example in colour










 

This work is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity.

'I liked the fake luxury of stainless steel. It has always been the luxury of the proletariat.'(Jeff Koons cited in Angelika Muthesius, Jeff Koons, Cologne 1992, p. 21)

Two Kids belongs to the artist's important and critically acclaimed 'Statuary' series in which he transformed readymade, low-art figurines and dolls found in gift shops by casting them in stainless steel. Utilising a material more conventionally associated with kitchen utensils as it were silver or bronze, Koons alchemises the commonplace into the extraordinary. He envisioned the 'Statuary' series as a commentary upon popular culture and society, placing the self-absorbed figure of Louis XIV, Le Roi Soleil at one end of the spectrum, and the most acclaimed American entertainer, Bob Hope, at the other. The form of each model selected in this series is closely linked with the underbelly of tourism and consumer culture from which they came. Their transition into a new, lustrous media and presentation as objects of cultural value and artistic importance takes the language of banality explored by Warhol and Pop art a step further.

The statue of Two Kids and their rounded, cherubic forms is taken from a generic fairytale such as Jack and Jill or Little Miss Muffet. There is a powerful visual irony here between the exquisite cast of the stainless steel and its novelty-item form and kindergarten subject. The collective title of the series, Statuary, similarly raises the question of the suitability of various subject-matter to statues. What is deemed artistically elevated and worthy enough of being enshrined for eternity in bronze, or in this case, in steel?

For Koons, the manufacturing industry is an extension of his palette, giving his ideas concrete form and offsetting his natural predilection for the baroque with the pared back and frozen feeling of manufacture. In Two Kids, Koons resuscitates the conceptual genius of Marcel Duchamp: by exhibiting something away from its original context and coercing the beholder into viewing it formally as an art object, formerly overlooked beauty and meaning emerges.