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San Francisco Chronicle​

Can Jeff Koons take a joke? This Bay Area artist is about to find out

Sometimes, you hear an idea for an art project that's so smart and funny, you can't wait to see how it gets realized. That was how I felt when Santa Clara artist Kathy Aoki told me about her developing series 'Koons Ruins.' The Koons in question is one of the most famous living artists in the world: Jeff Koons. The 70-year-old has been ubiquitous in the art market since the 1980s, known for works that reference everyday objects — basketballs, action figures, barware — that he heightens by inflating their scale and adding a glossy, pop culture sheen. Even if you don't know his name, you might recognize his work: 'Balloon Dog' and 'Tulips' sculptures, both made to resemble the kind of twisty balloon creations made by clowns; his gargantuan 'Puppy,' covered in flowers and greenery; or 'Come Through With Taste — Myers's Dark Rum — Quote Newsweek,' a fake magazine advertisement. Koons calls himself 'an idea person' and is not involved in the actual fabrication of his work. Still, his art sells for millions of dollars and is in museum collections across the globe. 'Even if people aren't familiar with his work, they can recognize gross commercialism when they see it,' Aoki told me, quick to state that she does not hate Koons or all of his work. 'But when he talks, I can't tell if he's smiling to himself like he's pulled the wool over the eyes of all these institutional directors, investors and collectors, or if he really believes in the work that he's making.' With its commentary about the art market, collectors and blue chip art that Aoki brings to Koons' work, she goes much deeper than the artist himself. 'Koons Ruins' is currently getting a high-profile preview this month on the Salesforce Tower's 'Day for Night' video installation. Aoki's five-minute animation features giant chipmunks roosting on a buried balloon dog sculpture and tractors bearing the 'Koons Ruins' logo. In the finale, a balloon sculpture is tossed over a waterfall, rises, and then sinks into bubbles. The video runs most days beginning at midnight. What made me fall in love with the 'Koons Ruins' project is the storytelling. Aoki, 56, invented an art collector named Dorothea James who was so offended by Koons' work that she makes it her mission to buy as much of it as possible so she can destroy it. The wrecked pieces are eventually put on view at her estate, now dubbed 'Koons Ruins,' and opened to the public upon her death. 'She goes so far as to hire her own team of chemists to undo the proprietary coating that Jeff Koons has made for his sculptures,' Aoki explained of the character. 'I'm enjoying exploring her character more, and why she's taken it this far.' When I met Aoki at her room at the Hotel Del Sol during the Startup Art Fair San Francisco in April, she had transformed the space into a visitors' center for the nonexistent location with a topographic map of the imagined art park, peepholes where you could see images of degraded Koons art, animation and even an audio tour. I laughed at installations that rated different Koons works for their level of offensiveness. I browsed the 'gift shop' with its T-shirts featuring crossed out balloon dog 'Koons Ruins' logos. Aoki is currently a fellow at the Lucas Artists Residency Program at Montalvo Arts Center in Saratoga and will be working a San Francisco residency at the Space Program in the fall. But the biggest supporter of her project is the New York-based nonprofit Creative Capital, which gave Aoki a $50,000 grant for the project this year. While Aoki has previously dipped into the pool of pop culture commentary and large-scale art with pieces like her 'Gwen Stefani Grand Burial Exhibition' (2009-16) and her 'Hello Kitty Monument' (2012-20), she is in new legal territory with Koons. Because her work references existing work by the living and notoriously litigious artist, she is carefully navigating how much of his works she can depict and how. Showing images she's created of Koons' art in various stages of decay have so far felt safe, she said, but she remains cautious. Aoki knows of the 2011 cease and desist letter San Francisco gallery Park Life received from Koons after selling bookends in the shapes of balloon dogs. (Koons himself has been the subject of at least four copyright infringement lawsuits.) But one of the benefits of Aoki's Creative Capital grant is access to lawyers who will advise her of her legal rights as an artist. Aoki's hope is that she can use the grant to create large, 'immersive scenes' that will pay homage to her practice as a print maker while also using two-dimensional elements. Eventually, however, she wants to take the narrative further. 'I would like to make a mockumentary film about the 'Koons Ruins,'' Aoki told me. 'There's just so many different elements of the story and approaches I'm excited about.'