Week 6 : Anish Kapoor Sculpture

Anish Kapoor's Cloud Gate (2004), Millennium Park, Chicago

Celebrated for his gigantic, stainless steel Cloud Gate sculpture in Chicago’s Millennium Park, Anish Kapoor is changing the cultural environment with his public works.


Discuss whether Kapoor's work is or isn't conceptual art.

Alberro (2000) explains:

"From its inception, and continuing to this very day, conceptual art has been entangled in controversy by those who stake claims to its foundational moment. This phenomenon is highly paradoxical given that, as with avant-garde practice in general, the emergence of conceptual art was the result of complicated processes of selection, fusion, and rejection of antecedent forms of strategies. Claims for the clarity and purity of the foundational lineage of conceptual art, therefore, should be considered with skepticism, since they are so limited, confusing, and often explicitly constructed in order to promote a particular, partial legacy." (p.16)

I believe Kapoor's work is conceptual art as he has worked with a raw idea that has taken precedence over any sense of traditional aesthetics or material concerns.


Research 3 quite different works by Kapoor from countries outside New Zealand to discuss the ideas behind the work. Include images of each work on your blog.

Leviathan (2011)

"While Kapoor has stated that the work’s title. ‘Leviathan’, was inspired by the 17th century philosopher Thomas Hobbes’s idea of the state as an unwieldy, inchoate monster, he has advised against over-literal interpretations. First and foremost the piece is a play of structure and scale that alludes to the idea of the cathedral: the body as living, breathing sacred space, inside a structure that is literally cathedral-like. If the scale is overwhelming and megalomanic, there’s a humour to the piece that feels very human. In the past I’ve never been entirely convinced by Kapoor’s work, feeling him to be more a planner of grandiose and rather soulless projects than an artist in the real sense, but in this instance he completely won me over."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-reviews/8506594/Anish-Kapoor-Leviathan-Monumenta-2011-Grand-PalaisParis-review.html

I feel as though this work's idea intentially misleads or surprises its viewers as there are two contradicting experiences. One outside the structure and one inside. These experiences contradict in the sense that what the viewer may see on the outside, is not what they should expect when they are on the inside.

Slug (2009)

Georgia O'Keeffe's

Gray Line with Black, Blue and Yellow 

"The work of Kapoor makes such musings a sensual experience. Look at his Slug — a vast, shiny red-lipped ovoid that looks as seductive as one of Georgia O’Keefe’s huge sexual flowers is attached to a coil of unspooling intestine still marked with the pencil notes of the technician. The inner and the outer, the made and the unmade, are contrasted in a piece that attracts the spectator just as it stirs a queasy repulsion." (www.entertainment.timesonline.co.uk)

My first impression of this work was that it was somewhat disturbing, but interesting at the same time, As I once again I feel a sense that there is more than one contradicting experience this work offers. There is something beautiful about the central focus of the work, but then the beauty is somewhat diminished by the sense of entanglement that has been designed to surround it.

Tall Tree and the Eye (2009)

"The steel structure, an arrangement of 76 shiny spheres which bubble up to the level of the surrounding Palladian buildings, is inspired by the words of the German poet Rainer Maria Rilke. 'It is a conjunction of images I have always loved in his Sonnets to Orpheus and this work is, in a way, a kind of eye which is reflecting images endlessly,' said Kapoor. Fifteen metres high, it has a look of weightlessness when viewed from the ground below. 'Now it is up, I am surprised by its fragility,' added the artist. 'There is nothing heavy or imposing about it, but there is something quite improbable. You cannot tell how it has been put up and that is part of its mystery and dignity.' Then Kapoor said he is intrigued by the empty spaces between the shapes he has made, and by the endless, repeating "fractal images" reflected on its polished surfaces. 'Inevitably the shape recalls DNA as a reference, but that is not what it is,' he said." (www.guardian.co.uk)

I feel as though the experience this work offers is somewhat one that provokes thought from its viewers as its design and structure challenges even the most basic knowledge of gravity and balance. Another feature of this sculpture that viewers may find intriguing is it's reflective material. The fact that it's shape is somewhat a reference to DNA, could possibly encourage viewers to "reflect" on themselves and maybe even human science.   

Discuss the large scale 'site specific' work that has been installed on a private site in New Zealand.

Kapoor's Dismemberment Stage 1 (2009)

"Anish Kapoor’s Untitled (as yet) 2009 is related to earlier temporary installations at the BALTIC and the Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall. But it is an intensely more sensual experience because it is conceived for a wild and unconfined landscape. The previous works, Tarantanrara 1999 andMarsyas 2002, were made to fill the box-like voids of exhibition halls. On The Farm there is no prescribed space to work within. Rather there is an undulating plane, far horizons and a wide sky. In response, Kapoor has nestled the work in a cleft cut into a high ridgeline. With views of the harbour to the west and mountains to the east it is as if he wanted to channel the forces of water, air and rock; and to link the width of the harbour with the height of the hills. The site elevates Kapoor’s work into view, but also makes it impossible to be seen entirely from any one position (other than the air). Even standing on the ridgeline close above it, the sculpture can’t be taken in without turning one’s head from side to side. Seen from a distance, the landscape gives it a nudge, playing tricks on one’s ability to judge size and proportion. But standing close to the 8-storey high work, it’s gigantic, mesmerising character kicks in. Composed of a vast PVC membrane stretched between the two giant steel ellipses, it has a fleshy quality which Kapoor describes as being 'rather like a flayed skin.' During one of the site’s frequent westerly winds it takes on a life beyond what Kapoor could ever achieve indoors. One can sense the wind, as one feels the breathing of someone lying nearby. Entering from the west, it doubles in force and its materiality is amplified, as it passes through the narrow waist and out the wide horizontal mouth of the leeward end. The sculpture breathes: expanding and contracting with each gust. Here Kapoor has realised something transcendent within a large sculptural object. It is architectural in scale yet mysteriously visceral and immediate in character. It is thoroughly exhilarating."

http://www.robgarrettcfa.com/thefarm.htm

I'd describe Kapoor's Dismemberment Stage 1 as a strategical success. This is because the site where the structure has been placed is very specific in terms of how it collaborates with it's environment and the landscape that surrounds it. It's this collaboration with nature as well as its sheer colossal size that provokes its audience to consider how the use of space and setting can enhance the overall experience of a sculpture.


Where is Kapoor's work in New Zealand? What are its form and materials? What are the ideas behind the work?

Kapoor's Dismemberment Stage 1 has been installed on a private "art park" in Kaipara Bay known as "The Farm" which is owned by New Zealand businessman and art patron Alan Gibbs. Its materials consist of "a custom deep red PVC-coated polyester fabric by Ferrari Textiles supported by two identical matching red structural steel ellipses that weigh 42,750kg each. The fabric alone weighs 7,200kg." (Anish Kapoor, 2010) The form of the sculpture is solely generated to collaborate with the enviroment as it acts with an inflating-like performance similar to a balloon when a western wind passes through it. I'm convinced that the idea behind the work was for Kapoor to make a direct connection between his sculpture and nature almost in the sense that he wanted to have control of it, “I want to make body into sky” (Anish Kapoor, 2010).

Comment on which work by Kapoor is your favourite, and explain why. Are you personally attracted more by the ideas or the aesthetics of the work?

Kapoor standing infront of his scultpure, Tall Tree and the Eye (2009)

Kapoor's Tall Tree and the Eye is without a doubt my favourite work of his as it's visually welcoming me to interpret it in a variety of ways because of it's shape and general aesthetics. If I were to visit this work in person, I'd want to view it from as many different perspectives as possible. I feel there is something intriguing about it's form that would encourage me to want to get up close to it and view each and every reflection visible from where I stand next to it. I believe I may also have an urge to climb it as well if I were to see it in real life. Just because I feel the spheric shapes have been composed in a manner that reminds me somewhat of a stairway up to the sky.

Reference List:

• Alberro, A. & Stimson, B. (2000) Conceptual Art: A Critical Anthology. Massachusetts, US: The MIT Press.
• http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-reviews/8506594/Anish-Kapoor-Leviathan-Monumenta-2011-Grand-PalaisParis-review.html
• Anish Kapoor sculpture blends fabric and steel in New Zealand (2010). Retrieved from http://fabricarchitecturemag.com/articles/0110_sk_sculpture.html
• http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/article6840014.ece
• http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/sep/20/anish-kapoor-sculpture-royal-academy
• http://www.robgarrettcfa.com/thefarm.htm