Jeff Koons’ Latest Artwork Offers “Hope” at Rockefeller Center

Pop artist Jeff Koons — who is having a moment with a recent show at Beverly Hills’ Gagosian Gallery, a love-it-or-hate-it handbag collaboration with Louis Vuitton and top honors at MOCA’s annual gala in L.A. — is seeing his 52-foot-tall, inflatable nylon sculpture Seated Ballerina installed in New York City’s Rockefeller Center.

Koons tells THR that Ballerina could help lighten the current political mood: “When you are in the presence of it, you feel hope and optimism for your future, the hope that people can have in knowing they have potential. Art is not the object. Art is inside the viewer. That’s the only thing that’s ever of value.”

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That said, the piece has added value: Proceeds from collectible tins will go to the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children. (The installation is co-presented by Art Production Fund and Kiehl’s, and the latter collaborated with Koons to create the collectible tins and is donating $100,000 to the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children.)

Ballerina is not Koons‘ first outing at 30 Rock: He has previously showcased floral sculptures Puppy (a 43-foot-high structure with 70,000 flowering plants, on view from June 6, 2000-Sept. 5, 2000) and Split-Rocker (a 37-foot-high creation with 50,000 flowering plants, on view from June 25, 2014-Sept. 18, 2014) there.

A version of this story first appeared in the May 15 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.