Renowned American artist first exhibition in the Gulf region titled Jeff Koons: Lost In America opened at the QM Gallery Al Riwaq, the expansive exhibition space located in Museum of Islamic Art Park with much gusto.
On view through 31 March 2022 and organised by renowned curator Massimiliano Gioni, Koons’s first exhibition in the MENA region provides a unique view into his exceptional career as one of the best-known contemporary artists, whose work bridges Pop, Minimalism and the readymade. Jeff Koons: Lost in America is part of #QatarCreates 2021, two weeks of cultural exchange, dialogue, and collaboration at the forefront of art, architecture, fashion, design, and digital culture, as well as the Qatar-United States 2021 Year of Culture, an international cultural exchange designed to deepen understanding between nations and their people.
Lost in America presents a portrait of American culture as seen through Koons’s autobiography, beginning with his childhood in suburban Pennsylvania. The exhibition features more than sixty artworks drawn from Koons’s four-decade-long career and is divided into 16 galleries, each introduced by an autobiographical text by the artist, emphasising his memories, influences and fascination with American visual culture. Conceived as an expansive self-portrait, the exhibition also includes sculptures and paintings with mesmerising, mirrored surfaces that reflect the viewers and call attention to notions of self-transformation and becoming.
Jeff Koons was born in York, Pennsylvania in 1955. He studied at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He received a BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art in 1976. Koons lives and works in New York City.
Since his first solo exhibition in 1980, Koons’s work has been shown in major galleries and institutions throughout the world. His work was the subject of a major exhibition organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art, Jeff Koons: A Retrospective (27 June–19 October 2014), which travelled to the Centre Pompidou Paris (26 November 2014–27 April 2015) and the Guggenheim Bilbao (9 June–27 September 2015). An exhibition of works by Marcel Duchamp and Jeff Koons, Appearance Stripped Bare: Desire and the Object in the Work of Marcel Duchamp and Jeff Koons, Even, was on view at the Museo Jumex in Mexico City (19 May–29 September 2019). Jeff Koons. Shine is on view at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, Italy, from 2 October 2021 through 30 January 2022.
Koons is widely known for his iconic sculptures Rabbit (1986) and Balloon Dog (1994–2000), as well as the monumental floral sculpture Puppy (1992), shown at Rockefeller Center and permanently installed at the Guggenheim Bilbao. Another floral sculpture, Split-Rocker (2000), previously installed at the Papal Palace in Avignon, Château de Versailles, Fondation Beyeler in Basel, and Rockefeller Center.
Sheikha Reem Al Thani, Acting Deputy CEO of Exhibitions and Marketing, Qatar Museums, said: “Qatar Museums is pleased to organise and present Jeff Koons: Lost in America, providing our community and visitors to Doha with access to Koons’s first exhibition in the Gulf region. Part of Qatar Museums’ mission is to encourage cultural exchange and dialogue through the presentations of many of the world’s most influential artists. This exhibition—a highlight of Qatar-USA 2021 Year of Culture—offers a unique view of Koons’s artworks that are an often-playful reflection of his observations and commentary on American culture.”
“I am honoured as an American artist to represent my country during the Year of Culture between Qatar and the United States. I have had amazing opportunities over the last two decades to visit Qatar, seeing its sites and cultural institutions and meeting some of its people,” stated Jeff Koons. “For me, it’s a dream come true for this exhibition to be part of the cultural exchange between Qatar and the United States. I am very grateful to Qatar Museums for inviting me to participate.”
Regarding his presence in Qatar, the American artist says “It’s really about what we have in common, and what type of common future we can find together, there is a time and place for everything and so It’s about finding a way forward that matters the most”
Exhibition curator Massimiliano Gioni, who serves as artistic director of the New Museum in New York, said: “With his aesthetics of plenty and his dreams of transformation and acceptance, Jeff Koons has been creating a strange mirage of America. This will appear even more exciting when seen in Doha against the background of a city that has taken the fascination with the new to vertiginous heights.”
Throughout his career, Jeff Koons has radically transformed the world of art, forging new relationships between the avant-garde and mass culture, while developing new paradigms for the role of the artist in the age of hyper-communication. He shares a preoccupation with American popular culture with many of his predecessors, who include artists such as Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol, and with peers such as Robert Gober, Barbara Kruger, Richard Prince, Charles Ray and Cindy Sherman.
Jeff Koons has received numerous awards and honours in recognition of his cultural achievements.
Written by Narges Raiss