Lot Essay
In Eastern mythology, the primordial universe was born from a golden egg. That sense of the comingled cosmological, mythological, and alchemical pervades Anish Kapoor’s Untitled, in which a golden concavity gleams like a gilded yolk at the heart of a bisected egg-like form. A British sculptor of Indian birth, Anish Kapoor produces radiant work with a spiritual quality not typically ascribed to contemporary art. In keeping with the post-minimalist style of Kapoor’s celebrated body of curved and brilliantly colored or reflective pieces, the present lot’s surfaces are perfectly smooth, with the hand of the artist conspicuously absent. This purity of form allows the viewer to lose him- or herself in the art’s serene golden luster. The experience of viewing moves from the realm of the ocular to that of the spiritual. Untitled transcends its very objecthood, putting the viewer in meditative conversation not with form, but with space and time, with a glistening embodiment of the infinite. Of the philosophical phenomenon that charcterizes his oeuvre, the artist has said, “The interesting thing about a polished surface to me is that when it is really perfect enough something happens—it literally ceases to be physical…What happens to concave surfaces is, in my view, completely beguiling ” (A. Kapoor, quoted in Anish Kapoor, exh. cat., Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, 2008, p. 53). The spatial complexities that Kapoor builds into the concave formation of Untitled ultimately evoke the contemporary sublime by splicing object from objecthood. In Anish Kapoor’s hands, the compact curves of a white eggshell can contain an infinite interior.
Kapoor is among the most significant sculptors of his generation. Born in 1954 in what was then Bombay, Kapoor, who is half-Jewish (and a practicing Buddhist), relocated to Israel to study electrical engineering in his teenage years. Abandoning engineering, Kapoor moved to London in 1973 to study art. A 1979 journey to his birthplace of India proved hugely influential for the sculptor, sparking his use of certain forms and saturated pigments, which he said were inspired by Indian spice markets. In the 1980s and 1990s Kapoor produced biomorphic work and began to gain serious critical acclaim, representing Great Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1990 and winning the prestigious Turner Prize the next year. In the mid-1990s, the artist commenced his exploration of the gleaming concave forms that have come to be so intimately associated with his oeuvre. In addition to critical success, Kapoor’s work has achieved formidable popularity, with his 2009 Royal Academy retrospective breaking attendance records for a London sculpture show. Over time, Kapoor’s sculptures have grown in scale and ambition to include major public artworks including Cloud Gate in Chicago, Sky Mirror in New York City, and ArcelorMittal Orbit in London, which he produced for the 2012 Olympic Games. In 2013, the artist’s vital contributions to the visual arts were honored with a Knighthood. Those contributions, of which a reinsertion of the spiritual and the sublime into contemporary art is paramount, are evident in full force in Untitled’s transcendental golden egg.
“The shiny might be a modern sublime, which is fully reflective, absolutely present, and returns the gaze” –Anish Kapoor (A. Kapoor in conversation with H. Reitmaier, Anish Kapoor, Tate Magazine, July 2007, anishkapoor.com).
“The shiny might be a modern sublime, which is fully reflective, absolutely present, and returns the gaze” –Anish Kapoor (A. Kapoor in conversation with H. Reitmaier, Anish Kapoor, Tate Magazine, July 2007, anishkapoor.com).
Kapoor is among the most significant sculptors of his generation. Born in 1954 in what was then Bombay, Kapoor, who is half-Jewish (and a practicing Buddhist), relocated to Israel to study electrical engineering in his teenage years. Abandoning engineering, Kapoor moved to London in 1973 to study art. A 1979 journey to his birthplace of India proved hugely influential for the sculptor, sparking his use of certain forms and saturated pigments, which he said were inspired by Indian spice markets. In the 1980s and 1990s Kapoor produced biomorphic work and began to gain serious critical acclaim, representing Great Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1990 and winning the prestigious Turner Prize the next year. In the mid-1990s, the artist commenced his exploration of the gleaming concave forms that have come to be so intimately associated with his oeuvre. In addition to critical success, Kapoor’s work has achieved formidable popularity, with his 2009 Royal Academy retrospective breaking attendance records for a London sculpture show. Over time, Kapoor’s sculptures have grown in scale and ambition to include major public artworks including Cloud Gate in Chicago, Sky Mirror in New York City, and ArcelorMittal Orbit in London, which he produced for the 2012 Olympic Games. In 2013, the artist’s vital contributions to the visual arts were honored with a Knighthood. Those contributions, of which a reinsertion of the spiritual and the sublime into contemporary art is paramount, are evident in full force in Untitled’s transcendental golden egg.
“The shiny might be a modern sublime, which is fully reflective, absolutely present, and returns the gaze” –Anish Kapoor (A. Kapoor in conversation with H. Reitmaier, Anish Kapoor, Tate Magazine, July 2007, anishkapoor.com).
“The shiny might be a modern sublime, which is fully reflective, absolutely present, and returns the gaze” –Anish Kapoor (A. Kapoor in conversation with H. Reitmaier, Anish Kapoor, Tate Magazine, July 2007, anishkapoor.com).