'Balloon Venus (Magenta), ' 2008–12. (© Jeff Koons/Gagosian Gallery)

Jeff Koons’s two-gallery blowout, his first large-scale appearance in commercial galleries in the city in 10 years and the unrivaled event of the spring art season (barring, perhaps, the Frieze Art Fair), is a roaring success, filled with feats of engineering and artistic choices that are as gleefully peculiar and perverse as any he has ever made. Mr. Koons strives to please, and he delivers.

Both shows are mostly made up of fairly large to gargantuan sculptures. At Gagosian, a threatening, man-size Incredible Hulk pushes a wheelbarrow filled with real flowers, all of them in full bloom. The Hulk appears to be made of thin plastic—a cheap inflatable toy writ large—but in fact, in a signature Koons trompe l’oeil, it is an immaculate bronze cast. Huge new stainless steel balloon sculptures are characteristically grandiose and dripping with sexual innuendo: a red monkey with a phallically sloping tail, a blue swan with a twist of material that resembles a rectum, and a magenta Venus of Willendorf that was modeled on the circa 24,000 B.C. sculpture of that name and flaunts numerous voluptuous curves.

'Antiquity 3,' 2009–11. (© Jeff Koons/Gagosian Gallery)

Viewing these sculptures can be a queasy experience: even while reveling in Mr. Koons’s delirious visual splendor, one is confronted with the dubious values that undergird it. This is art about the relentless pursuit of perfection and control, seven-plus-figure luxury goods pitched to billionaires and realized with massive sums of capital and labor. They embody and promote a determined lust for accumulation—a drive for money, sex, fame and historical stature. These sculptures’ sheer audacity and expense are, inextricably, ingredients in their production.

And these new pieces are even more audacious and expensive-looking than past Koons efforts. Even his paintings, long his Achilles’ heel, stun. Meticulously painted by teams of assistants, they’re fantastical, flat collages of works by artists including Picasso and Louis Eilshemius, as well as anonymous abstractions and photographs of ancient statuary, 1950s fetish pinup Bettie Page and various inflatable toys. Each has a cartoon sketch on top that resembles both a sailboat and a vagina. By the logic of that second image, and Mr. Koons’s flair for sexual imagery in general, viewers’ eyes penetrate the image, plunging into his strange elixirs of art history and sensuality.

Detail of 'Gazing Ball (Ariadne),' 2013. (© Jeff Koons/David Zwirner)

The pieces at Zwirner are comparatively austere white plaster sculptures modeled on ancient art (a reclining lady, a hulking nude man) and quotidian American culture (a long row of mailboxes, a birdbath), each with a reflective royal blue gazing ball perched on some part of it. The reflective balls, familiar from prototypical American front yards, take in and reflect the entire gallery. Mr. Koons’s best work tends to be his most ostentatious, his priciest, so these (relatively) modest pieces seem to run the risk of being consigned to the status of minor side projects. (Mr. Koons’s museum-filling Whitney Museum exhibition is scheduled to open next year, and the question of what will or won’t make the cut plays around these two shows.) But that would be a mistake, since they seem to evince a newfound interest in process (plaster often being used to make copies of sculptures or as an intermediary material in their creation) and experimentation (some are damaged in sections or missing limbs, though they are otherwise smooth).

'Metallic Venus,' 2010–12. (© Jeff Koons/Gagosian Gallery)

Another intriguing outlier is a turquoise sculpture at Gagosian based on the ancient Greco-Roman Callipygian Venus—the Venus of the beautiful buttocks. It has an exaggeratedly smooth shape in some sections—note the toeless feet—that create warped reflections. If it weren’t for the real white flowers sitting in a vase alongside the Venus, she could be mistaken for a digital apparition. That strange sheen makes her look thrillingly unstable, as if she could vanish into the ether at any moment, caught up in the currents of money and speculation that flow through Mr. Koons’s oeuvre and that are ultimately so essential to it.

For decades, Mr. Koons’s work has looked alluring and only vaguely sinister. Just a few years ago, some wondered if his decadence would weather the recession. Now we have our answer. His work is stronger than ever, and so is the nimbus of darkness around these saccharine daydreams. “I’m always very upset if somebody doesn’t like my work,” Mr. Koons has said, “because I never want to lose anyone.” We’re certainly all still watching.

(Through June 29, 2013)

(Courtesy Getty Images)

This morning a call went out on the New York Foundation for the Arts job board for a wood carver who might be interested in "full-time employment with leading contemporary artist Jeff Koons in a demanding studio atmosphere."

The job entails creating wood copies of objects in photographs, something Mr. Koons has done before, with varying degrees of success.

What could he be making? Mr. Koons currently has a show up at Gagosian Beverly Hills, which doesn't seem to feature any wood, another show at David Zwirner this May and, of course, a major retrospective at the Whitney Museum in 2014, so there's no lack of venues to show new material.

(Courtesy Château Mouton Rothschild)

The Drinks Business blog reports that Jeff Koons has been tapped to create the label for Château Mouton Rothschild's 2010 Pauillac first growth. Previous artists to have that honor include Warhol, Picasso and Dalí. (Thanks to Art Observed for bringing this to our attention.)

Describing the label at left, the blog says that "Koons works over a Pompeii fresco of the Birth of Venus with a silver line drawing of a ship sailing under a bright sun." Which, wow, versions of that line drawing have appeared on a number of Mr. Koons's recent paintings, and that's not how we would have described it.

Anyway, about the wine, the blog reports that the château says its 2010 Bordeaux was made with "small, rich, naturally concentrated grapes both high in color and natural acidity, with length, elegance and harmony being the hallmarks of the vintage."

Length, elegance and harmony. That sounds like Mr. Koons.

Koons. (Courtesy Getty Images)

The Art Newspaper reported in Miami today that Jeff Koons has planned a show at David Zwirner for this May, his first with the gallery and a major coup for the blue-chip Chelsea stalwart.

Mr. Koons has been represented by Gagosian Gallery for over 10 years. The New York Times has a quote from Gagosian Director Rebecca Sternthal, who says, “The gallery still represents Jeff Koons. He works closely with us and with Sonnabend. In the past he has had shows in different galleries but we are still actively working with him and with his studio." A show of Mr. Koons's work "Coloring Book" opens at the gallery's Beverly Hills location tomorrow.

This past fall at Christie's New York, Mr. Koons achieved a new auction record, $33.7 million for a monumental tulip sculpture seen in the photo to the left, that now makes him the second-most-expensive living artist, just behind Gerhard Richter's $34.2 million auction record.

At a press conference after the sale Koji Inoue, head of evening sales for the postwar and contemporary department, called the auction, "four aces across the board."

"It's very difficult to have a strong grouping of Pop Art, cutting edge contemporary, Abstract Expressionism, sculpture and other media," Mr. Inoue said, of the accomplishment.

The sale had an impressive sell-through rate of 92 percent by lot, with just six pieces failing to sell and only five failing to sell within or above their presale estimates. Taken together with the Sotheby’s results of the previous evening, the sale would seem to confirm the strength of the contemporary art market. In setting the highest-ever total at a contemporary auction, Christie's breaks its own record, set this spring at a sale that netted the house $388.5 million. Tonight's sale becomes the second highest in the house's history—its $491 million Impressionist and Modern sale back in November 2006 continues to hold the top spot. Christie’s made $112.9 million over its low estimate of $289.4 million—and that’s all the more impressive in an auction season where neither of the major houses' Impressionist and Modern auctions met their respective low-end estimates.

The top lot, at $43.8 million, was the artwork that graced the catalogue’s cover, Andy Warhol's Statue of Liberty, a two-tone silk screen from 1961 that the house had cheekily marketed with 3-D glasses that came with the catalogue.

The new Basquiat record achieved this evening—$26.4 million for an untitled painting of a fisherman—is the third for the artist this year, indicating his ever-climbing prices. It made $6 million over the latest record set at Christie's London this summer, and represents a 2,600 percent price increase from when the picture last came up at auction at Christie's New York in 1988. The painting sold this evening to Christie’s Chairman of Postwar and Contemporary Development Amy Cappellazzo. Bidding for a client on the phone, she impatiently gestured at Mr. Pylkkänen to bring down the hammer, adding, "Thank you," when he did. Phone bidders won most of the big earners tonight, including the record-setting Jeff Koons Tulips (1995–2004) sculpture positioned outside the house, which sold for $33.7 million with premium. Mr. Koons's previous record was a balloon sculpture that sold at Christie's London for $25.7 million in 2008.

Another of the major lots, a 1981 Andy Warhol silkscreen of Marlon Brando on a motorcycle in The Wild One, saw a spirited 8 minutes of bidding that included Joseph Nahmad and, on the phone with a client, Christie's Chairman Bret Gorvy, who at one point threw out a sheepish $100,000 over $20 million, a bid that elicited a disappointed look from Mr. Pylkkänen and laughter from the room. Mr. Gorvy continued to bid against the Nahmad family, who eventually bought the work for their collection at $23.7 million, with premium.

"It's an absolutely iconic work," said Joseph Nahmad after the sale. "It's such a sexy pose."

And a sexy investment! When the work came up at auction in 1997, at Sotheby's New York, it sold for just $1.7 million, and when it did again in 2003 at Christie's New York it went for $5 million.

An Anselm Kiefer saw bidding from both Larry Gagosian and Thaddaeus Ropac, who both show the artist, playing out on a micro level a larger competition the two had last month in Paris, when they both opened new spaces there with Kiefer shows. Dealer Jack Tilton offered some spirited bidding on a Cy Twombly that eventually sold for $4.4 million at hammer and a Jasper Johns that nearly doubled its high estimate at $1.7 million.

A notable failure was lot 31, a Gerhard Richter from 1983 from the collection of Steven A. Cohen, which failed to sell at $8.8 million. It was notable because the Richter market has been red hot in the past year or so, but also because the sale, overall, was a roaring success.

"Most of the important lots saw five or six or seven or eight bidders," Mr. Pylkkänen said at the post-sale press conference. "This was an exceptional sale."

The fall auction season finishes tomorrow night at Phillips de Pury & Co. All auction research courtesy of Artnet, all images courtesy of Christie's.

While the creation of the sculpture might be over, Mr. Koons is nonetheless still hard at work on crafting and maintaining his image. Despite having a broken wrist, which was in a cast (the result of a horseback-riding incident), he was charming and upbeat, much like a professional model, seeking the best angle, variously standing or sitting, feigning at turns surprise and conviviality, and even giving us some pointers: “Come around from here," and, "I can stand over there.”  Mr. Koons once again proved that he is his own greatest creation.

Koons. (Ralph Orlowski/Getty Images)

Last Friday evening in the Guggenheim’s basement auditorium, Jeff Koons, in his trademark smooth, soothing tone, told a sold-out crowd about something he often does before he goes to sleep. “At night, what I like to do, as an individual, when my wife is getting ready to go to bed and my children are already in bed, I go online,” he said excitedly, “and I just look at Picasso’s work.”

Mr. Koons said that Marcel Duchamp has long been a huge influence on him, but that he has become more impressed with Picasso over the past two decades. In fact, he’s started collecting the artist’s work, and has loaned one of his paintings to the exhibition on view in the Guggenheim’s galleries upstairs, “Picasso Black and White.” A 1969 scene of a bald man aggressively kissing a woman, it hangs near the top of the rotunda.

As a student at the Art Institute of Chicago, Mr. Koons said, he used to visit Picasso’s 50-foot-tall metal sculpture in Daley Plaza. “I watched children climb on it,” he recalled. “I climbed on it!”

Art historian Pepe Karmel, who joined Mr. Koons for the Guggenheim talk, said a walk-through of the Picasso show with Mr. Koons and the show’s curators took four hours—the artist had a lot to say.

Dr. Karmel was particularly surprised by his response to Picasso’s Milliners Workshop (1926). “You remarked, ‘There’s a lot of happiness there.’” he said, adding that, to him, it was a “dark and spooky picture.” It’s a large work, with mostly gray and black shapes, and shows Picasso’s young lover, Marie-Thérèse Walter, living with her sister and mother. Picasso’s head appears to be coming in through a door.

“It seemed kind of very optimistic, just the flowing of lines,” Mr. Koons explained. An image of the painting was on a screen behind him, and he aimed a green laser pointer on one bulbous shape. “This almost looks like a hand here opening a doorknob, but that could also be a symbol of Marie-Thérèse touching his phallus,” he said enthusiastically. In the audience, there was some nervous laughter.

Later, this talk of sexual potency led Dr. Karmel to discuss the 19th-century concept of a life force that could be expended through sexual or creative acts. “Balzac, the great novelist, once said, ‘Every time I make love, I lose another story,’ he said. There was a very long pause, and he began to change the subject, but Mr. Koons cut in. “I think with Picasso,” he said, “it’s the opposite.”

arusseth@observer.com

Koons. (Getty Images)

Jeff Koons is having his first exhibition in Brussels in 20 years; it opens Oct. 6 at Almine Rech gallery. And that is news! But far more impressive than that news is the following sentence in the exhibition's press release which may, as indicated in our headline, be the best sentence in any press release ever released in the history of press releases released to the press.

"Neither Koons nor his art can ever stay static: his oeuvre is like a quivering organism, ceaselessly buzzing with life, producing ever new and more surprising, vivid forms."

Remarkable! According to this sentence, Jeff Koons's art is, pretty much, that cavernous, gothic outer space WMD chamber in Prometheus, packed with obsidian vials leaking dark ooze that turns into—well, any number of quivering, buzzing, surprising organisms, such as slickly-fanged worms that invade people's bodies via the mouth and, in turn, giant mouth-like creatures with countless tentacles and what you might call a violent lust for regeneration (talk about vivid; this is why going to outer space in the first place is a bad idea).

Elsewhere in the press release mention is made of "high points," "intimate juxtapositions," the "pulse of humanity," "the libido and the core of our humanity" and "a permanent state of tumescence"; a sailboat is called "an erotic visual double entendre" and a statue has "a perfectly callipygian rear," as in ass. (This last bit refers to Mr. Koons's new "Antiquity" series, in support of which Homer is duly quoted.) We hope that those assembling the catalogue for the Whitney's 2014 Koons retrospective are paying careful attention to this nuanced language.

In the context of a reference to a series of major Koons shows that opened this past summer, the Rech exhibition is said to be "expand[ing] again, on this extraordinarily rich and fecund season" and we are told that one of those shows, in Frankfurt, "anchor[ed] his … practice at the heart of a climactic tradition of sculpture" [emphases ours, emphases very much ours]. We are also told that the exhibition will enable us to "penetrate deeper within Koons's ever more fascinating, and effervescent universe." But alas, reader, we are not going to go there.

For more on Jeff Koons's upcoming exhibition, see www.alminerech.com. For more on art exhibition press releases, see Alix Rule and David Levine's article in Triple Canopy.

The winners are as follows:

Eli & Edythe Broad Award for Philanthropy in the Arts
Paul G. Allen, Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist

Isabella and Theodor Dalenson Lifetime Achievement Award
James Rosenquist, artist

Outstanding Contributions to the Arts Award
Brian Stokes Mitchell, performer and chairman of the board of the Actor's Fund

Bell Family Foundation Young Artist Award
Josh Groban, singer, songwriter, actor and founder of the Find Your Light Foundation

Arts Education Award
Lin Arison, co-founder of the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts and YoungArts

The five winners will each take home a magnificent statuette that was designed by Jeff Koons in 2010, presented below. Click it to see an even larger version. And then imagine Richard Serra, who is one of the evening's presenters, handing it to one of the lucky winners. Pretty awesome.

The award, which was designed by Koons. (Courtesy Americans for the Arts)

Jeff Koons, Michael Jackson and Bubbles, 1988. (Courtesy Frankfurt's Liebieghaus)

Reporting from London's Impressionist and contemporary art auctions, Souren Melikian reports a "noticeable change of mood this week in the art market." [International Herald Tribune]

Cecilia Alemani, curator and director of High Line Art, has joined Twitter. [@ceciliaalemani]

Sarah Thornton visits with Jeff Koons in Frankfurt, and he tells her he is fond of "the idea that we can create our own reality." [Artforum]

An exhibition at the High Museum in Atlanta promotes new photographs and old ones about the American South. [NYT]

Here's some cool multimedia from the opening of LACMA's Levitated Mass. [LA Times]

Jonathan Jones argues that art did not necessarily come from cave paintings of Neanderthals. [Guardian]

The Wall Street Journal talks to Rineke Dijkstra about her show at the Guggenheim. [WSJ]

Jeff Koons talks to Bloomberg about his latest series, "Antiquity." [Bloomberg]

"A stolen bust of Auguste Rodin, sculpted by his lover, Camille Claudel, has been recovered 13 years after it was stolen from a museum in central France." [The Daily Telegraph]

The artists behind the much-buzzed about papier-mâché sunbathers in an empty downtown lot in Los Angeles have been revealed. They say they did it for "art's sake" and that they just wanted to make people notice things that would be "otherwise invisible." [LA Times]

An inmate imprisoned for a fatal shooting has sketched in Golf Digest. [Buffalo News]