Jeff Koons: Money & Value | Art21 "Exclusive"

Episode #098: Artist Jeff Koons discusses themes of money, desire, perfection, and moral responsibility. Filmed in his busy New York studio and surrounded by numerous assistants at work on paintings and sculptures, Koons describes how the practicalities of running a business are often in service to creative ends.

Jeff Koons plucks images and objects from popular culture, framing questions about taste and pleasure. His contextual sleight-of-hand, which transforms banal items into sumptuous icons, takes on a psychological dimension through dramatic shifts in scale, spectacularly engineered surfaces, and subliminal allegories of animals, humans, and anthropomorphized objects. The subject of art history is a constant undercurrent, whether Koons elevates kitsch to the level of Classical art, produces photos in the manner of Baroque paintings, or develops public works that borrow techniques and elements of seventeenth-century French garden design. Organizing his own studio production in a manner that rivals a Renaissance workshop, Koons makes computer-assisted, handcrafted works that communicate through their meticulous attention to detail.

Learn more about Jeff Koons: http://www.art21.org/artists/jeff-koons

VIDEO | Producer: Wesley Miller & Nick Ravich. Interview: Susan Sollins. Camera: Brian Hwang, Clair Popkin & Joel Shapiro. Sound: Mark Mandler. Editor: Paulo Padilha. Artwork Courtesy: Jeff Koons.

I'm pleased that there's a dialog about my work

but there's some misrepresentation, some people

may think that my work is just about money.

Certain aspects of my work are about money because

my work also talks about desire

but ahhh... the work's not about money, it's not

about just making something to sell.

I've learned earlier on, when Ι always worked

with ready made objects; that Ι'd do everything

to care and protect that ready made and

to preserve each integrity and every perfection

and imperfection

and one day when I made a sculpture ahh...

everything was a fiasco, and ahh... I couldn't save

the sculpture unless I really did something radical to it.

And I've realized to that moment that I really didn't care

about objects - I cared about people, and

that's where the imperfections were, that's where the perfections were

that I really cared about.

And so I feel a moral responsibility everytime

I make something, to give something a hundred

per cent because that's what I care about; I care about the view.

You know, especially today it's not unusual for

artist that large, studios...

if you're interested in making more than one painting

a year or if you're interested in making more than

one sculpture, you have to be able to have support.

I like to work with people because I don't wanna be in

a room by myself. I mean, I love the sense of family

that I have with my studio.

It's part of business aspect of work and making

things you don't have to look at the bottom line on

each issue. If you want to create something, even

though it's impractical and usually they're really.

The best things are impractical. Great art usually

is very impractical, you know you can just go about

and you can make it. You really don't have any

choice, cause if you're making your work:

you have to do it.