Leviathan by Anish Kapoor

Indian-born, british-based artist anish kapoor created a temporary, site-specific installation inside the nave of the glass-domed hall of the grand palais.

Each year the french ministry of culture and communication invites a leading artist to create a work that responds to the exceptional architectural space of the grand palais in paris. the sheer monumental scale of the building provided the inspiration for a big idea: monumenta.

the space was originally unveiled at the 1900 universal exhibition. For its fourth edition, after guest artists anselm kiefer, richard serra and christian boltanski, it has been the turn of anish kapoor to meet the
challenge with a brand new work for the 13,500 m2 space.
Anish kapoor's artwork celebrates neither permanence nor eternity, but instead the transitive, fugitive nature of instants.
'It is a single object, a single shape, a single colour. the dense red reminds us of the colours we see in our eyes at night - unstable and monochrome - red creates much more sombre shadows, psychologically and physically, than black or blue.'

With this exhibition, he calls for museums to close for a day in protest at detention of artist ai weiwei in china.
'as a colleague – I don't know him personally – I feel that as artists we have a communal voice and it's important that we stick together, that we have a sense of solidarity with each other,' anish kapoor said.
'it would be nice to see the art world come together a little more. Perhaps all museums and galleries should be closed for a day across the world. I think some such campaign needs to form itself.'

The event is an initiative of the french ministry of culture and communication (direction générale de la création artistique) and is co-produced by the centre national des arts plastiques (cnap), the grand palais and the réunion des musées nationaux.
commissioner: jean de loisy


monumenta 2011
'leviathan' by anish kapoor
grand palais, paris
may 11 to june 23rd, 2011


Text and images via www.designboom.com