Pop Goes The Lobster

What is art?

I found myself pondering this question on the Tube train today which is, I can assure you, a first.

I was on my way back from visiting the Jeff Koons: Popeye Series exhibition at The Serpentine Gallery in London's Hyde Park. As some of you may recall, it was last Summer that I stumbled across one of his giant "inflatables" on outdoor display whilst looking for somewhere to have lunch. I doubt that I'll ever forget the amazement of that serendipitous discovery, and when I saw that Koons' first solo exhibition in the UK was being staged I simply had to go.

The Serpentine Gallery is probably one of London's lesser-known venues. Nestling behind the trees of the park, you could be walking along the road not a hundred metres away and yet remain blissfully ignorant of its existence.

The building itself, originally built as tea rooms in 1934, is pleasant enough but completely overshadowed by the Pavilion outside. The Pavilion functions as a cafeteria but is, itself, a work of art. Each year, sometimes more than once a year, a new Pavilion is designed and built by invited architects or designers. This year's consists of a series of functional areas linked by pathways, the whole sheltered by a highly reflective, sweeping, curling roof which gives a most intriguing view of the bald spots of all the men walking below.

But I digress.

The Koons exhibition contains much that would be familiar to anyone who knows his oeuvre, particularly the aluminium "inflatables", painted with such care and thoroughness that it is impossible to say with any certainty that these heavy, metal works are really anything more than inflated plastic. This series centres on replicas of children's pool-inflatables, and the pieces are produced with the characteristic workmanship, right down to the usage warnings on the undersides and the occasional colour overlap.

I was more surprised by the paintings: these photo-realistic compositions look like multi-layered collages whereas they are, in fact, created entirely in oil and acrylic. At the risk of sounding pretentious, the juxtaposition of the various elements in these did capture my attention in a wholly different way than did the sculptures; and there was something intriguing about how elements from the sculptures reappeared in the 2D works, or to look at it another way, how the 2D elements took on a life of their own as sculptures.

For me, at least, the exhibition was interesting and certainly visually stimulating, enough so that I am considering a return visit with Son next weekend. But does this qualify it as art?

Koons talks loftily of his work as exploring areas such as consumerism, taste, banality, childhood and sexuality. He talks of art being in the experience of the viewer rather than in the object being viewed. Perhaps.

Critics, on the other hand, have claimed that his work is nothing more than clever craftsmanship with no underlying emotional impact or deeper meaning, designed purely for commercial gain. There have also been rather snide comments about the way that the pieces are produced: his studio has been called a factory where an army of helpers with paintbrushes, sprays and buffers do the actual work of turning Koons' designs into product.

But how much does any of this really matter? Koons isn't the first to have assistants; there's a long tradition of apprentices working for master artists as they learn their craft. At least the senior members of Koons' team are thanked by name at the exhibition and in the guidebook.

Surely, whether the work of one man or a talented and hard-working team, its the outcome that really matters? Yes, there's a place for art that stirs the emotions, and for art that engages the intellect, but is there not also a place for art that simply appeals?

It seems to me that Koons is the inheritor of the Pop-Art tradition. While Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol produced pieces that reflected the culture of the time, the fact that I see no deeper meaning doesn't devalue their appeal for me. Why should I not feel the same way about Koons' work?

I'll leave you, though, with a comment made by one clearly fretful mother who was ushering out her young sons as I was entering: "They really should have warned us that there'd be naked women in there". Her partner replied with what could only be called a devilish smile: "At least there weren't any inflatable naked women".