Manufacturing The Most Expensive Art in The World - Jeff Koons

[@ericwilkerson4683]

This was my first art job a week after graduating from art school. I still use some of the color matching techniques I learned in this studio. What an education.

[@alexwilliamyt]

Awesome!

[@douglasriddle6447]

Enjoy your videos, but Koons is a prime example of the NY Art Market Con Job

[@alexwilliamyt]

Thanks! I agree - although as I mentioned in the video, I didn't want to go into that too much. It can over-shadow the amazing creative work that actually goes on behind the scenes.

[@douglasriddle6447]

@@alexwilliamyt Granted the old masters had people working in their studios, but the old masters still did part of the actual work, even if it was only on the central figure. I think guys like Koons are great designers, but not sure if I would call what they do being an artist.

[@tatemarsland957]

@@douglasriddle6447 the role of the artist changes in tandem with technology

[@RHrrrrrrhhhhhh]

Really enjoy your videos. It’s hard at times to explain our process as an artist and this is a great way to share a glimpse into what makes us as uniquely us

[@tthomas184]

The metal casting for balloon dog may have been manufactured in California, but the actual prototype from which the cast was made, was done in the Soho New York studio. Thats Jeff posing on an early version, taken in the NY studio.

[@alexwilliamyt]

Interesting, thanks for the info!

[@alexwilliamyt]

Thanks for watching! If you want to support the production of these videos, liking the video will go a long way! Or, check out my Instagram (link in description) and consider dropping me a follow. I'm aiming to reach 1k followers before the end of the year.

[@kaijah.zinester.kjmart]

I love these videos so much, these deep dives make me think how the act of creating can be so involved an thought out! Thank you for making this!

[@alexwilliamyt]

Thanks for the support! :)

Loved it - thanks. :)

[@alexwilliamyt]

Thanks for watching! :)

[@nidaljabarin4743]

Is this art or business!!! An artist should paint by himself!!

[@pedinurse1]

Can deone explain how this is art, I struggle

[@edwardrichardson8254]

Francis Bacon's Three Studies of Lucian Freud (1969) sold for $142.4 million in 2013, so old school painter-at-easel still rules. All of this began at the Renaissance with the invention of the portable framed painting (as opposed to Medieval tapestry) but the real driver was the new economy created by the Medici family who revolutionized banking, creating the art world first by creating the economy that created the collectors, the merchant princes. Now it is capitalism. In 2023, the United States added 500,000 new millionaires, more than any other country in the world, bringing the total number of millionaires in the U.S. to 7.43 million, with a combined fortune of $26.1 trillion. There are over 100 BILLIONAIRES in the "communist" Chinese politburo for crying out loud. So it's not just aristocrats doing tours of the Continent collecting art as it was for centuries. The notion of the artist as culture hero was created in the Renaissance as well; before then they were just nameless artisans no more important than plumbers. It really kicked off with Cellini's autobiography documenting his creating his Perseus bronze statue. I'll give you taste of the drama with this excerpt from Camille Paglia's fantastic SEXUAL PERSONAE: "Cellini’s bronze Perseus is forged in a Wagnerian storm of western will. The artist attacks by earth, air, water, and fire. He piles on wood, brick, iron, copper; he digs a pit; he hauls ropes. He shapes his hero out of clay and wax. He exerts superhuman energies, until he is struck down by fever. Cellini takes to bed in ritual couvade, while Perseus strains to be born. The metal curdles and must be resurrected from the dead. Finally, the shouting, cursing artist, transfigured by creative ecstasy, defeats all obstacles and brings Perseus into the world in an explosion, “a tremendous flash of flame” like a thunderbolt. Cellini has made “miracles,” triumphing by a godlike blend of male and female power. Now Perseus is placed in Florence’s public square. At its unveiling, the crowd sends up “a shout of boundless enthusiasm.” Dozens of sonnets are nailed up, panegyrics by university scholars. The Duke sits for hours hidden in a palace window, listening to citizens acclaim the statue. This thrilling episode demonstrates the potential for collectivity at certain privileged moments in history. The Renaissance made public art, uniting the social classes in a common emotion. A figure on a platform; the mingling of nobles, intellectuals, plebeians: one thinks of the broad audience of Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre. It is impossible to imagine a modern art work provoking a shout from a socially mixed crowd. Our sole equivalent is cinema, as at the Atlanta premiere of Gone with the Wind. Cellini illustrates the national differences in Renaissance form: in Italy, the objet d’art; in England, drama." How is that for high? Not quite the same as Koons' and Murakami's interns working for extra credit, is it?

[@rafaelaparollari603]

this is so distopic. The artist creates the artwork in small scale, and then the multiple craftsman recreate it in a tedious, micro level detail, in a huge canvas, for the Big man to call it theirs… i things this is, at least, a great analogy of the current capitalist society, we done Koons. And btw great videos, im enjoying them a lot

[@conchesodan]

well... I guess you don´t like Renaissance master´s either based on what you said here.

[@yisusferro603]

@@conchesodanwell, that´s the typical cliché answer to people who critize contemporary factory artists The truth is most of classic artist didnt use an army of assistants to paint, some they had a few but mainly because you had on those times to manufacture paints, priming canvases, buying stuff, arranging models but most of them except a few they painted all the paintings by themselves. Im artist and for me is a little sad to see a lot of artists becoming more a design studio rather than doing a personal art. I can understand to have assistants to help you with certain things as could be the case of Anselm Kiefer or Chuck Close when he was alive but Marilyn Minter´s case is just a woman saying to other people what to paint.

[@danielvaladez197]

Some "Artists" are just brands nowadays

[@conchesodan]

Well... I guess if you just want to paint. Join Jeff´s attelier... What I see in another way is that he works just like all the grand masters of the renaissance... yet people do overlook this fact. For me, as a more expressionistic type of artist, I cannot relate to this ultra-methodic process... Not my taste, not the outcomes I enjoy. Plus I do value the charm on single artists doing their best in many aspects.

[@DanSwanson2070]

He pays them $14 an hour. Terrible.