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DOUBTED LOVE: The Tyranny of Pornography and Jeff Koons’ Made in Heaven series

Higgens, Brittany (2015) DOUBTED LOVE: The Tyranny of Pornography and Jeff Koons’ Made in Heaven series. [MRP]

Item Type: MRP
Creators: Higgens, Brittany
Abstract:

In 1990, New York based artist Jeff Koons presented a body of related works under the poetically vague title “Made in Heaven” which presented sculptures and photographs of the artist and his then wife (former adult industry star Ilona Staller, known as La Cicciolina) in various moments and positions of passion. Colorful and glossy, pointedly referencing the stylistics and aesthetic conditions of Rococo painting and sculpture and undeniably explicit in the depictions of arousal, intercourse and the acrobatics of love-making, the series was generally, indeed, almost universally vilified. But what was strikingly overlooked was that the series constituted a carefully considered and calculated interrogation of questions surrounding representations of sexuality in the age of mass media. Through an analysis and contextualization of select Made in Heaven works, this paper explores the ways in which Koons dismantles cultural binaries in order to challenge and expand the limitations of erotic art.

Date: April 2015
Uncontrolled Keywords: Jeff Koons, Sculptures, Photographs, La Cicciolina, Rococo, Intercourse, Erotic Art
Divisions: Graduate Studies > Contemporary Art, Design and New Media Art Histories
Date Deposited: 27 Jul 2015 16:25
Last Modified: 21 Dec 2021 00:30
URI: https://openresearch.ocadu.ca/id/eprint/251

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