Created more than a century apart, two monumental highlights from Sotheby’s May auctions, William Bouguereau’s La Jeunesse de Bacchus, 1884, and Jeff Koons’s Elephant (Violet), 1995, are playfully juxtaposed in our New York flagship, now newly reopened after an extensive renovation by OMA’s Shohei Shigematsu. The staggering 90,000 square feet of museum-quality exhibition space are designed to showcase a wide range of art, from the most precious objects to bold works of massive proportions, such as these. Installing the 12-foot-tall stainless steel Koons and the 134-year-old, 20-foot-long Bouguereau were extraordinary feats of teamwork and engineering. As the new galleries were readied for the big reveal, we captured the two superstars as they became the first to grace the walls – and floors – of the city’s premier new venue for viewing art.
