How did it go with the elephant and the china shop?
A collector accidentally dropped a prized balloon dog owned by world-famous artist Jeff Koons (68) at Art Wynwood in Miami (Florida) on Thursday.
The dark blue porcelain sculpture looks like it was tied up by a clown at a child’s birthday party and was supposed to sell for $42,000 at the art fair. Instead, officials swept up the remains.
Jeff Koons’ blue balloon dog (left) was on sale at Art Wynwood in Miami for $42,000 — until an art collector wanted to take a closer look
Photo: Bel-Air Fine Art – Contemporary Art Galleries
Pop artist Stephen Gamson was at the fair with friends when the woman organized the accidental farewell party. He thought at first that the accident was part of a performance, like the “ miami herald” told.
▶︎ He believes that the woman just wanted to touch the balloon figure with her finger to see if it was really rubber. Unfortunately she wasn’t.
“It was like Banksy destroying his work of art”
In the videos that Stephen Gamson made on his instagram page published, delighted visitors can be seen gathering around the shards. “Oh my God, this is exciting. Look, this is the new art exhibition now. Because it’s all there, don’t you see?”, says an Englishwoman.
“It was an event!” gallery employee Bénedicte Caluch told the Miami Herald about the show’s company. “Everybody came to see what happened. It was like Banksy destroying his artwork.”
A crusher is built into the frame of this painting.
Photo: Dominic Lipinski/dpa
In 2018, the anonymous artist saw his most famous motif “Girl with Balloon” auctioned at London auction house Sotheby’s for £1 million (€1.2 million). Shortly after the hammer fell, he destroyed the painting at the push of a button using a shredder hidden in the frame.
▶︎ The action did not hurt the market value of the image: Banksy renamed it Love Fails and auctioned it in October 2021 for £18.5 million (€20.8 million).
Art fan wants to buy shards
Will this also happen to the balloon dog? Art junkie Stephen Gamson wanted to buy one of the fragments right away: “For me, it has value even if it’s broken. For me, the story behind it makes the art even more interesting.”
Either way, the Koons sculpture is insured. The gallery must not suffer any damage.
Jeff Koons himself probably won’t keep the woman ostracized either. When one of his balloon dogs (also in Miami) broke down in 2016, he reacted calmly: “It sucks when something like this happens, but it’s just china. (…) We will simply replace them”, he said at the time. Page Six“.
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