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contemporary sculpture

MCA: Anish Kapoor

At Australia’s MCA, an exhibition by famous contemporary British sculptor Anish Kapoor is a tour de force, writes Susie Burge

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Above: Anish Kapoor 2007. Image courtesy and © the artist. Photograph: Phillipe Chancel

There’s largeness about Anish Kapoor, in every way. His voice is resonant and modulated, with the eloquence of a Shakespearean actor; his presence is charismatic (he’s not a tall man, yet there’s a compelling aura); and of course there’s his work. In 2011 Kapoor installed “Leviathan” in the Grand Palais in Paris. Part of the annual Monumenta series (following on from Anselm Keifer and Christian Boltanski), Leviathan, strikingly, architecturally and quite beautifully, took up the entire gi-normous space, as if the building itself were pregnant, and created a new transitory environment. In 2012, his mad tower - Orbit - was the headline art exhibit and viewing platform for the London Olympics. Now, in Sydney, he addresses the contentious issue of public sculpture (he’s on record as saying he thinks it should be more than a bit of decoration on the lawn) by waving a hand to the surrounds, the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge, both visible from the museum, as effective (architectural) examples of public sculpture. Kapoor is a believer in scale. Placed just outside the Museum of Contemporary Art, his own Sky Mirror joins the conversation.
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