Stainless

(Balloon Dog, anodized stainless steel. Jeff Koons)

In the absence of a New Year newspaper, I re-read last Saturday's in more detail, and was struck by the story surrounding the Jeff Koons exhibition in the Chateau de Versailles.

Koons' sculpture is kitsch, but so gloriously so that it's hard to take offence at his work. However an art critic who also claims to be a direct descendant of Louis XIV, calling himself Prince Charles-Emmanuel de Bourbon-Parme, has decided that holding this exhibition of Koons' sculpture in his supposed ancestor's palace is demeaning, and so he is giving legal battle against this "mercenary" and "pornographic" offence against the also supposedly great name of his forefather.


(Louis XIV, bust, stainless steel, Jeff Koons)

Apparently his greatest objection is to a bust of his royal forebearer sculpted from that "proletariat material", stainless steel. He's right, stainless is a proletariat metal, one that I regard as one of the greatest inventions of the 20th century. Consider: before 1915, only gold held its lustre for any length of time. No-one poor could hold anything in their possession which was shiny and larger than jewellry. Silver tarnishes, and must have done so quickly in the sulphur-rich smoky indoors environment where open fires were the norm. Silver spoons were the prerogative of the rich, and had to be cared for and polished to prevent them from blackening both during and after use. And both silver and gold are soft metals which hold their shape badly and so are unsuitable for any engineering purposes; indeed they have few uses apart from as displays of wealth. [Yes, I know, they're important for electronics, but that wasn't the case before 1940]

Then, in the smoky centre of Sheffield, during the first world war, stainless steel, inox, rostfrei, was developed. That alloy of cheap iron with vanadium, chromium and sometimes manganese has given the world a new material for everyone's everyday use. It's made surgery safer, it's made cooking easier, it provides brightness and functionality into so much of our lives. And yet, because of its ubiquity, it's not appreciated as the great invention it truly is.

What else is as tough, as beautiful, as useful, as stainless steel?

Those master cutlers and metallurgists of Sheffield are among the most unappreciated men of the last hundred years, and that's a shame upon us all.

:o)


(Pink Panther, Jeff Koons.
I'm not sure about this, though. Perhaps it's too kitsch for even me)


:0)