A huge hand that lifts up a bouquet of tulips: For more than two years, Paris has argued about this monumental sculpture by Jeff Koons. Now work has begun on the installation near the Champs-Elysées. At the beginning of October, the more than ten-meter-high sculpture made of aluminum and steel will be inaugurated. Nevertheless, not all are happy with it.
The 62-year-old American Koons, who is known for his monumental, pop-colored sculptures in bright colors and considered since the auction of his balloon dog 2013 at Christie's as the most expensive living artist in the world, had the city after the terrorist attack in Bataclan 2015 with the draft his To express sadness and compassion. His flowers are both a memorial and a gesture of friendship between the US and France. But the Paris art milieu felt ignored.
First, it was about location and size: the critics criticized the prominent location not far from the Eiffel Tower, on the forecourt between two museums of modern and contemporary art that would have been dominated by it. Above all, they saw in the gift a commercial coup of the American star. The cost of production, estimated at over three million euros, is not borne by the artist, but by French and American collectors and patrons.
"Disneyland aesthetics" or optimism?
And even the work itself was not only enthusiastic, because the former Wall Street broker Koons applies with his shiny chrome balloon figures and life-size Michael Jackson made of porcelain as an icon of capitalism and consumer culture. His cheery-ironic works between kitsch and art symbolize for many viewers a typically American-inspired optimism.
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Controversial gift: Thank you for the flowersThis "Disneyland aesthetics" should be "placed in front of the Trump Tower," scolded Parisian cultural workers, who perceived the work as disrespectful. In addition, the idea to place the colorful eye-catcher as a memorial, not Koons own idea but been initiated by the US Embassy in Paris.
The debates about the flowery gift raised further difficult questions: is a work of art in itself a good way to stimulate discussion of one of the most terrible attacks that has ever taken place on French soil? And if so, can one rely on a sumptuous consolation instead of remembering the horror? Are the uplifted tulips, inspired by the torch of the Statue of Liberty, the appropriate symbol? Should one include Parisians or their survivors?
Only at the location was the city of Paris flexible. In order to settle the dispute, Jeff Koons were proposed several sites that were initially not all central enough for the artist. Soon, the impressive "Bouquet of Tulips" will now be in the small park in front of the Petit Palais Art Museum. Currently, the parts are still covered with plastic tarpaulins. Pretty sure it will be from October to the new trendy selfie backdrop.