Flag
25 5/8 x 31 inchesFlag, 2020
paper: 25 5/8 x 31 inches
image: 22 1/4 x 28 inches
edition of 40
signed and dated
Jeff Koons '20in pen lower right recto
numbered lower left recto
Pristine condition, unframed
Literature
"David Zwirner per Joe Biden. A ottobre il lancio della vendita "Artists for Biden," Arts Life, September 9, 2020.
Gabi Czöppan, "Was macht die Koonst?" Focus October 16, 2021, reproduced in color.
Additional Photos
Full sheet
Image detail
Signature & Date lower right
Edition number lower left
Koons' work invites us to experience pleasure without guiltand nowhere is this more obvious than the Celebration series. Where Made in Heaven sought to remove shame from sex, the Celebration works that followed directly after were made to conjure the wonderment, blissful naivety and freedom of childhood. What was originally conceived as a small project has since developed into Koons' most elaborate series to date, comprising twenty monumental sculptures and sixteen large-format oil paintings.
JEFF KOONS BALLOON FLAG
The Jeff Koons flag lithograph from the "Easy Fun" series of animal shapes was created in 1999. For this limited edition of only 99 impressions, Jeff Koons created a shaped outline of a flagand used richly colored lithographic inks to simulate a watercolor effect, so the print looks unique.
Executed in 1999, flag is an exquisite and monumental ode to childhood and innocence that formed the central painting in Jeff Koons' Easy Fun series. Koons' Easyfun series came after the lengthy process of creating his Celebration, which have remained in production to this day. The Celebration series consisted of paintings and sculptures that also explored and celebrated childhood experiences. Koons himself explained that they were intended in part as postcards to his son, who was taken by his mother, La Cicciolina, to Italy following the end of their marriage. When he began the Easyfun series in 1999, childhood was on Koons' mind for very different reasons: he had remarriedand had a young family again. Being a father and finding himself immersed in the world of childhood once more, Koons was able to appreciate the overwhelming power of the unique perspective we enjoy during youth and which is channeled so effectively in the visual feast of cereal, toys and cream of flag.
Koons' work invites us to experience pleasure without guiltand nowhere is this more obvious than the Celebration series. Where Made in Heaven sought to remove shame from sex, the Celebration works that followed directly after were made to conjure the wonderment, blissful naivety and freedom of childhood. What was originally conceived as a small project has since developed into Koons' most elaborate series to date, comprising twenty monumental sculptures and sixteen large-format oil paintings. Celebration continued Koon's interest in notions of the cycle of life. He started the series with the concept to make a calendar featuring various festive images, some of them made from balloons, many of them linked to times of the year such as Valentine's, Easter, birthdays and the coming of spring-events that he was experiencing anew after the birth of his son in 1992. He began creating simple photo studies of handmade balloon forms and store-bought items that would end up summoning an abundance of new ideas for immaculate, glistening sculptures and hyper-real paintings. "I took my camera and prepared these set-ups," Koons explained. "I shot some balloon tulips on a reflective backgroundand I made a balloon dog, again on a reflective background. I bought a hanging heart with some gold ribbon from a shop window I saw on Lexington Avenue and I photographed a bread with an egg. I shot these different images and soon realized that this was too good, that I had more than a calendar here. I had a whole body of work" (J. Koons, quoted in T. Vischer, "Dialogues on Self-Acceptance: Jeff Koons about Himself and his Work From Conversations with the Artist, New York, Early February 2012, Part I," in S. Keller and Vischer (eds.), Jeff Koons, exh. cat., Riehen, 2012, p. 34).
Through his intensely bright paintings of a party hat, or a slice of heavily-iced cake, to the brilliantly shiny Balloon Flag or heart-shaped ornaments, Koons hopes to awaken the child that exists inside all of us. The transcendent sense of joy expressed in the Celebration works make them highly idealistic as they deal with "hope, the future and with respect for humanity" (J. Koons, quoted in, Jeff Koons, exh. cat., Kunsthaus Bregenz, 2001, p. 25). This social aspect to art is all-important to Koons. By depicting the world of the child with all the sophistication and technical craftsmanship available to the adult, he appeals to what is good in people. He asks us to recapture that time in our lives before we were indoctrinated into the expectations and value judgments of society, when heaven could be found in a piece of foil-wrapped candy or a cereal-box toy. His goal is to return us to those associations, to that openhearted delightednessand the vehicles he chooses are simply archetypes of our shared experience. Koons wants his work to be as accessible as possible, to break down the segregation between high and low culture so no one is made to feel inferior. This inclusivity, he believes, will ultimately free us from self-imposed constraints: "My work is a support system for people to feel good about themselves and have confidence in themselves-to enjoy life, to have their life be as enriching as possible, to make them feel secure-a confidence in their own past history, so that they can move on to achieve whatever they want" (J. Koons, quoted in H. Werner Holzwarth (ed.), Jeff Koons, Cologne, 2009, p. 456).
