While Koons may be a man on the moon, he’s looking back at Earth, oblivious to the vastness behind him, if only he would turn around.
But perhaps I’m missing the point — after all, why would Koons turn around to face the chill of the infinite universe, when he has the whole world in the palm of his hand?
Though Koons will be the first artist to “install” art on the moon, sending art to space is nothing new. Happily for those of us still invested in art’s purpose to interrogate our human condition (and, occasionally, to transcend it), there are many other artists who are concerned with both the concept and the reality of outer space, using it to critically engage with ideas of representation, belonging, and existence.
It is no surprise that many of the artists grappling with the subject most successfully are women and artists of color. For those who are not White American male artists with their choice of the world’s top galleries (Koons recently jumped from the behemoth Gagosian to the equally hulking Pace), it is the empty frontier of space that is appealing, as it offers an opportunity at least to theorize a utopian vision for our future, one in which everyone — including those marginalized on Earth — thrives.