The “balloon dog” sculpture, pictured, shortly after it broke.
Cedric Boero
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Cedric Boero
The “balloon dog” sculpture, pictured, shortly after it broke.
Cedric Boero
Welcome to the new NPR series, where we highlight the people and things that are making headlines – and the stories behind them.
Honestly, the main character in this story is the woman who bumped into the pedestal holding the Jeff Koons “balloon dog” sculpture, send it to its death on the floor at the Miami art fair last week.
But considering it was probably the most humiliating moment of her life, we’ll leave her anonymous. And instead, turn to the man trying to pick up the debris. Literally.
This is one of the (remaining) versions of the balloon dog. The one that broke is a much less.
Image of Cindy Ord/Getty for the Qatar Museum
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Image of Cindy Ord/Getty for the Qatar Museum
Who is he? Artist and collector Stephen Gamson was pointing the porcelain bubble dog to his friend when the whole thing fell apart.
- “Just like me [was doing] so much so that the shards fell and broke into thousands of pieces,” he told NPR.
- The $42,000 sculpture, on display at Bel-Air Fine Art’s booth at an exclusive preview event for Art Wynwood, a contemporary art fair. And as crowds began to gather around the new debris, Gamson began filming.
- On his Instagram post, you can hear the idea forming in real time.
- “If you want to sell the tail…” one can hear him say as a gallery employee tries to clear the mess in the trash.
What is the big problem? While the woman who hit the pedestal was probably trying her best to suppress the memory, Gamson loved the movie. He thinks the work is worth salvage in its current state.
- “I find value in it even when it’s broken,” Gamson Talk to emissary miami. “For me, it’s the story. It makes art more interesting.”
- Gamson, who calls himself an “art junkie,” has been a collector since the age of 17. His attraction to the broken bubble dog makes sense when you consider what else he might find value there: “I used to rummage through the junkyard looking for art, too, you know, places where I know famous artists have worked.”
- If he buys Koons crumbs, it won’t be his only branded item.
- “I used to write to Keith Haring, and I’ve become a pretty important collector of Keith Haring,” he told NPR.
Want more journalism on art and culture? Listen Consider this episode above Romance novel sales spike
What are people saying?
- Gamson may be right when he says that the hot air balloon dog has a second life, AD In his Instagram video you can hear a woman commenting, “You see, that thing is the new art installation! Everything is art, isn’t it?”
- When Gamson approached a Bel-Air Fine Art art consultant about buying the works, she laughed and replied, “For $15 million? That’s right.” emissary miami report.
- And what might the Koons themselves think? Considering it’s happened before, he probably doesn’t care much. Another of his porcelain balloon dog sculptures was destroyed in 2016. His reaction? Shrug.
- “It’s embarrassing when that happens, but, you know, it’s just a porcelain plate,” he told Page Six.
- Koons sold a giant version of his bubble dog for 58.4 million USD in 2013and then six years later, a sculpture of his rabbit Sold for 91 million USD – set a record for a living artist.
- So a five-figure loss this time around probably won’t break his world. Plus, it’s covered.
Jeff Koons poses during a press preview of his “Lost in America” exhibition at the Qatar Al Riwaq Museum Gallery in Doha in 2021.
Image of Cindy Ord/Getty for the Qatar Museum
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Image of Cindy Ord/Getty for the Qatar Museum
So what now? Okay, let’s say the gallery actually sets a price for these pieces and lets Gamson own them. What will he do with a pile of broken blue porcelain?
- “I was thinking I could put them in some kind of plexiglass box with a sign on it,” he said. “They can be incorporated into a work of art I created myself. There are so many to choose from.”
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