For the first time in Israel, Jeff Koons, one of the world's most influential and famous American artists, will exhibit at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art this March
The artwork of Jeff Koons is considered one of the most expensive in the art world, and he consistently breaks sales and visitor records at his exhibitions in the world's largest and most celebrated museums. This March, Jeff Koons will be coming to Israel for the first time, for his solo opening at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art. Koons is considered one of the most influential, popular and controversial living-artists in the world. His art is unique and unusual and he is considered a cultural phenomenon whose work echoes and influences beyond the boundaries of the art world.
Jeff Koons at Rockefeller Center © Mike Coppola/Getty Images
Jeff Koons, born in 1955, in York, Pennsylvania, is an American neo-pop artist, who started in the 1980s exploring the significance of art and spectacle in a media-saturated era. He did so by adopting aesthetics that escalated consumption culture, which has only intensified during this decade. Koons' work has been produced with extreme perfectionism, which has given them a religious-like aura and attracted art collectors and the general public alike.
Bear and Policeman, 1988 © Jeff Koons
The exhibition "Jeff Koons: Absolute Value – From the Collection of Marie and Jose Mugrabi" will be on display in the Tel Aviv Museum of Art's gallery, in the museum's large exhibition space, which spans 850 square meters. The exhibition will present a selection of large-scale works from different periods throughout Koons' career, from the 1980s to the present. It will also include works that will be revealed to the general public for the first time.
Hulk Rock © Tom Powel Imaging
"Absolute Value" is a mathematical concept that indicates the size of organs in the numbers field: the absolute value of a number is the distance between it and the zero point on the numbers axis. The title places Koons himself - the artist and the phenomenon - as the axiom of contemporary art; an artist who is an irrepressible phenomenon, a genius and a symbol of the era.
Jeff Koons' "Balloon Dog" at Christie's in New York © DON EMMERT/AFP via Getty Images
“The Tel Aviv Museum of Art is proud to host one of the greatest artists of our time, Jeff Koons - a prominent and influential figure in contemporary culture,” says Director Tania Coen-Uzzielli. “We are delighted to present Koons’s first exhibition in Israel, marking a significant cultural milestone in our country. I would like to thank Jose Mugrabi for his remarkable generosity in making this exhibition possible, offering our visitors the opportunity to experience these spectacular works of art."
Jeff Koons: Absolute Value – From the Collection of Marie and Jose Mugrabi. Tel Aviv Museum of Art, March 20 - October 2020