Split-Rocker

Yesterday I walked around Rockefeller Center and saw the cutbag of Jeff Koons’s Split-Rocker--a sculpture that towers over 37 feet high and features over 50,000 flowering plants. This planted form is composed of two halves: one based on a toy pony of one of Koons’s sons, the other based on a toy dinosaur. Together, they form the head of a giant child’s rocker. Split-Rocker at Rockefeller Plaza had been a tourist attraction and popular photo motif during the last months. Just in time for today's start of autumn the flowers are gone. By yesterday there was only the rack made of steel, soil and geotextile fabric left.

Jeff Koons, Split-Rocker, 2000, Photo: Benjamin Sutton

I was wondering if the omniscient Wikipedia had taken note of the temporary installation of Split-Rocker at Rockefeller Plaza. Lo and behold, it had not yet:

Split-Rocker

In 2000, Koons designed Split-Rocker, his second floral sculpture made of stainless steel, soil, geotextile fabric, and an internal irrigation system, which was first shown at the Palais des Papes in Avignon, France. Like Puppy, it is be covered with around 27,000 live flowers, including petunias, begonias, impatiens, geraniums and marigolds. Weighing 150 tons and soaring over 37 feet high, “Split-Rocker” is composed of two halves: one based on a toy pony of one of Koons’s sons, the other based on a toy dinosaur. Together, they form the head of a giant child’s rocker. Koons produced just two editions of the sculpture. As of 2014, he owns one of them; the other is in the collection of Mitchell Rales.

 So I decided to edit this post and added the last sentence:

Split-Rocker

In 2000, Koons designed Split-Rocker, his second floral sculpture made of stainless steel, soil, geotextile fabric, and an internal irrigation system, which was first shown at the Palais des Papes in Avignon, France. Like Puppy, it is be covered with around 27,000 live flowers, including petunias, begonias, impatiens, geraniums and marigolds. Weighing 150 tons and soaring over 37 feet high, Split-Rocker is composed of two halves: one based on a toy pony of one of Koons’s sons, the other based on a toy dinosaur. Together, they form the head of a giant child’s rocker. Koons produced just two editions of the sculpture. As of 2014, he owns one of them; the other is in the collection of Mitchell Rales. In summer 2014 Split-Rocker was installed at Rockefeller Plaza in New York City for several months in coincidence with the opening of Koons’s retrospective at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

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