Jeff Koons’ Rabbit has sold for $91 million dollars.
It’s a three foot tall steel casting made from an impression of…a balloon rabbit.
It’s the sort of thing that gets the usual people huffing and puffing the usual blandishments – but not everyone is kissing up to the artist or the buyer. This from – who else – NPR’s Neda Ulaby:
ULABY: Jed Perl, another distinguished art critic, is even more grossed out than Jerry Saltz by the sale. Perl doesn’t even like the sculpture. Here’s how he describes the most expensive piece of art by a living artist.
PERL: It’s a metal molding of a plastic blow-up toy.
ULABY: Perl finds the smooth, faceless “Rabbit” emotionally empty to the point of being dead. But plenty of other people see a sense of humor in the sculpture and in its highly polished surface, a reflection of our increasingly impersonal and overhyped world.
Well, I certainly see humor in the fact that something this trite has people this completely bonkers.
Is anyone but me working on a polished-steel casting of a tulip bulb, just out of pure ironic commentary? (Liberals – ask you economically-literate parents).
Leftists have gone past the point of self paraody, its why AOC press bot got banned from twitter. It was too close to the real thing. A decade ago this would have been a Onion article, no its real life…
I think the art world has been infected with craziness for many, many years. Andy Warhol’s re-colorized images of things or people, Picasso’s silly unfolded subjects, Dadaism… etc. Ninety-one mill for a steel rabbit only adds to the craziness.
Where’s the drum? Do you get batteries with it? Looks like the White Witch got to the Energizer Bunny!
Seriously, as jdm suggests, this is really about the so-called “elite” playing stupid games with each other, and with us. Don’t forget for a minute that the reason the elites can write $91 million checks for a metal bunny is because they recover every penny they pay in taxes by appealing to their networks.
That looks like the kind of thing the homeowner melts down over as it hits the dumpster in Hoarders.
“Nooooo! Not the steel bunny!! I neeeed that for my work!!”
It’s only worth $40 million… not a penny more.
It’s a coded Steely Dan reference, perhaps.
Who knew “Steely Dan” would trip the spam filter?
#MitchKnew
I was wondering about that.
Same usefulness as the money spent on MNLARS.
Same usefulness as the money spent on MNLARS.