Artists, filmmakers and the former minister of culture called on Paris authorities to scrap its plans on installing a controversial memorial.
A 3D Illustration of Jeff Koons’s Bouquet of Tulips, 2016. Source: Jeff Koons/Noirmontartproduction/Artnet
An open letter published by the French newspaper Libération was signed by more than 20 cultural figures, who describe the work as “shocking” and suggest Koons had “ulterior motives”.
The work Bouquet of Tulips may become the artist’s biggest sculpture, measuring 10 metres high and 8 metres wide. A hand holding a bunch of tulip-shaped balloons is a reference to the hand of the Statue of Liberty France gifted to the United States in 1886. Initially, Koons said that the work would be a gift, but it turned out later that only the idea was free. The installation, which costs $4.3 million, is supposed to be financed by the French government.
It is just one complaints raised in the letter – the work is called “too costly” for the state and tax payers. The authors also disagree with the proposed site for the memorial – a square in front of the Palais de Tokyo and the Museum of Modern Art of the City of Paris. The letter calls the location “cynical” and “opportunistic”, because it has no connection to the sites of the terrorist attacks.
Koons didn’t donate money for the sculpture, which is almost finished by now. However, he is going to donate all revenue from the ensuing postcards of the sculpture to the families of the 130 victims from the terrorist attacks for 25 years, the Art Newspaper writes.
The open letter was signed by filmmaker Olivier Assayas, director of the New National Museum of Monaco Marie-Claude Beaud, former minister of culture Frédéric Mitterrand, artists Christian Boltanski, Jean-Luc Moulène and Tania Mouraud and others.
Subscribe to our mailing list: