Anish Kapoor’s development in sculpture is defined by his illusionary void, within the Double Mirror installation. Through the use of his non traditional approach, he has challenged the social concern with identity. The success of the Double Mirror installation has been contributed to by historical developments from Surrealism and Futurism ideals. It has also been influence by the art practices of Brancusi and Giacometti Surrealism initiates the ideals of releasing the unconscious in illusionary state of mind, and has encouraged Kapoor to explore into the unconscious identity.
Kapoor credits Futurism for presenting a space beyond viewer perception. Brancusi distinguished the importance of aura within the medium. This has provided Kapoor with the opportunity to reveal his own aura of vertigo by means of the void in the reflective material which challenge’s viewers to question their identity. Giacometti contributes to historical developments by creating the sensation of emptiness within the negative space of the figure, establishing a collective cultural identity for his figures.
This creation of emptiness for the collective identity has made an impact on Kapoor’s installation by forcing the viewer to contemplate their collective cultural identity in their reflection of nothingness. Kapoor’s inclination toward belongs to the Post-Minimalist movement in their ideal to represent the purest aesthetic form and create a spatial relationship between the viewer and the object. By forcing the viewer to challenge the void of aesthetics and recognized their identity in their experience within a spatial void.
Kapoor breaks sculptural convention with his non-traditional approach asking the viewer to bring expression to the sculpture, thus questioning the role of the artist as the representation of the expression. He also breaks sculptural convention through the use of this medium. The medium is the message rather than the medium illustrating the message. Kapoor’s Double Mirror installation’s sculptural concerns are rooted in the psychological element of dualism.
Dualism confronts the viewers to connect identity to matter and spirit, visible and invisible, conscious and unconscious, body and mind. Kapoor situates the installation within the space of social history of Post-structuralism in his thought that the meanings of his work are constructed by an individual. In addition, he conveys the Marxist ideals in their opposition to ownership of art and possibility of a utopia. He creates spaces that cannot become commodities. Kapoor challenges social identity in the presence of hybrid cultural society.
Kapoor’s installation is a quest for alternative space in human relations which have the possibility of a utopia. He has faith in the capacity of the human race to be held together within a singular body. In the Double Mirror installation, the mirror’s void frees the viewer from their ethnic background, leaving just the voice of the viewer. He identifies the “other” in the context of belonging and alienation thus challenging the social concern of identity. The understanding of the context of an art work relies on knowing the foundation of the artist.
Anish Kapoor was born in 1954 in Bombay, India, to a Hindu father and a Iraqi Jewish mother. In 1973, determined to become an artist and moved to London, England. “Kapoor found the city hugely disorientating and very difficult, and the trauma of sudden transition led to years of psychoanalysis” (Burnett, 114). He achieved his artistic background at Hornsey School of Art and Chelsea school of Art and Design. The Double Mirror installation is a singular work exhibited at the Hayward Gallery in London in 1998.
This installation is comprised of two larger circler concave stainless steel forms, highly polished to possess a reflective surface. These reflective forms are set across from each other not to create an infinite repeat, quite the opposite, at certain position the image is erases and an illusionary void stand in its place. “This art strives to lift us out of the familiar, to bring about altered states of being” (Carlisle, p50). The Double Mirror has contributed its existence as a result of historical developments in sculptural practices.
Kapoor’s installation will be contextualized within Surrealism and Futurism ideals and in the art practices of Brancusi and Giacometti. Surrealism idealizes the release of the unconscious. Man Ray’s Enigma of Isadore Ducasse, a covered the object, triggers the imagining of what the eye cannot perceive thus activating the viewer unconscious desire for the object to be. In the context of the Double Mirror, Kapoor employs similar release of the unconscious. The viewers unconscious has the desire is to distinguish self identity within the illusionary void, like the object in Ray’s work.
In the Uncanny Structure of Culture Difference in the Sculpture of Anish Kapoor, the author Andrew Teverson verify the previous statement , “the viewer-subject loses grip on the singular, monoscopic vision of self, and enters a shifting, kaleidoscopic world inbetween that is inhabited by the ghosts of his or her own possible manifestations…”(82). Futurism development in sculpture was portraying a space beyond viewer’s perception. Boccioni’s Development of a Bottle in Space, represented the concealed space by manipulating the physicality of the sculpture.
Boccioni cuts into the sculptural representation of the bottle to bring forth the unseen space within it. Kapoor regards the void contain in the Double Mirror as an illusionary space beyond viewer awareness of space. Parallel to Boccioni, Kapoor exploit the property of the material thus opening the open the viewer perception of the void space. The “surfaces are designed ‘to make something else possible’: they use their reflective qualities to draw in the world around them and to blur the boundaries between seen and unseen” (Teverson, 85-86) The significance of the aura within the medium has been notable in Brancusi art practice.
Brancusi achieved the aura of infinity in the photography of the Endless Column. This aura was the impression of vibration in the double expose of the work. Kapoor present the aura of vertigo in his installation by of the void which challenge’s viewers to question their identity. “The dominant sensation created by Kapoor’s work as a result of this impression of continuity, extendibility and loss of coherent self, is of vertigo” (Teverson, 87. ) “The illusion of space is different from the creation of emptiness” ( Bhabha, 11) Giacomettis established artwork with a collective cultural identity through emptiness.
Giacometti’s People in the Piazza, is the creation of the sensation of emptiness within the negative space of the figure, establishing a collective cultural identity for his figures. Parallel to Giacometti, Kapoor’s Double Mirror opens the viewer to contemplate their collective cultural identity in their reflection of their nothingness. The space within the installation emptiness is an “interrogative place, which leaves us no option but to incorporate with the object, ourselves and others” ( Bhabha, 11). Kapoor Double Mirror installation would not be read in the context of identity of self and as a ultural collective, if the above artist did not initiate a new way of conceptualizing art. Donna De Salvo a associate director and curator at the Whitney Museum admires Kapoor for his “ knowledge of the history of art and capacity to connect with his audience” (Burnett, 114). Kapoor’s inclination toward belongs to the Post-Minimalist movement in their ideal to represent the purest aesthetic form and create a spatial relationship between the viewer and the object. By forcing the viewer to challenge the void of aesthetics and recognized their identity in their experience within a spatial void.
Kapoor breaks sculptural convention with his non-traditional approach asking the viewer to bring expression to the sculpture, thus questioning the role of the artist as the representation of the expression. He also breaks sculptural convention through the use of this medium. The medium is the message rather than the medium illustrating the message. Kapoor’s Double Mirror installation’s sculptural concerns are rooted in the psychological element of dualism. Dualism confronts the viewers to connect identity to matter and spirit, visible and invisible, conscious and unconscious, body and mind.
Kapoor situates the installation within the space of social history of Post-structuralism in his thought that the meanings of his work are constructed by an individual. In addition, he conveys the Marxist ideals in their opposition to ownership of art and possibility of a utopia. He creates spaces that cannot become commodities. Kapoor challenges social identity in the presence of hybrid cultural society. Kapoor’s installation is a quest for alternative space in human relations which have the possibility of a utopia. He has faith in the capacity of the human race to be held together within a singular body.
In the Double Mirror installation, the mirror’s void frees the viewer from their ethnic background, leaving just the voice of the viewer. He identifies the “other” in the context of belonging and alienation thus challenging the social concern of identity. “I don’t want to make sculpture about form, I wish to make sculpture about the experience that is outside of material concerns” (qtd. in Oxford Dictionary, 308 ). Bibliography Allthorpe-Guyton, Marjorie. Anish Kapoor Taratantara. Barcelona, Spain: Actar / Baltic, 2000. “Anish Kapoor. ” The concise Oxford dictionary of art and artists . rd ed. 2003. Anish Kapoor, et al. Anish Kapoor with essays by Homi K. Bhabha and Pier Luigi Tazzi. London : Hayward Gallery ; Berkeley : University of California Press, 1998. Burnett, Craig. “SPACE ODYSSEY. ” ARTnews. 104. 1 (2005): pp. 112-115. MasterFILE Elite. EBSCOHost. Georgian College, Library Common, Barrie, ONT. 3 October 2007 . Bryant, Eric. “Anish Kapoor. ” ARTnews. 106. 5 (2007): p156. MasterFILE Elite. EBSCOHost. Georgian College, Library Common, Barrie, ONT. 3 October 2007 . Carlisle, Isabel. “Into the wild blue yonder. ” New Statesman 127. 4383 (1998): p50.
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Krauss, Rosalind, “Richard Serra, Atranlation”, The Originality of the Avant-Garde and other Modern Myths ,Cambridge, Massachusetts : MIT Press 1991 Teverson, Andrew. “The Uncanny Structure of Cultural Difference in the Sculpture of Anish Kapoor. ” Gothic Studies. 5. 2 (2003): pp81-96. Academic Search Premier. EBSCOHost. Georgian College, Library Common, Barrie, ONT. 3 October 2007 “Transcript of the John Tusa Interview with the sculptor Anish Kapoor” BBC Radio 3. BBC. 10 October 2007 Wei, Lilly. “Anish Kapoor. ” ARTnews 103. 8 (2004): p141. MasterFILE Elite. EBSCOHost. Georgian College, Library Common, Barrie, ONT. 3 October 2007 .
