“In a painting the space is beyond the picture plane, but in the mirrored voids it is in front of the object and includes the viewer. It’s the contemporary equivalent of the sublime, which is to do with the self – its presence, absence or loss.”
Glowing and orb-like with a flawlessly polished concave silver surface, Anish Kapoor’s Untitled from 2006 evokes an endless stream of allusions spanning myriad cultures and mythologies. Encompassing the entirety of its surrounding space, the present work’s immaculate, reflective material projects a visual and physical weightlessness, creating an illusion in which the piece appears to float. Its shimmering, resplendent form encapsulates Kapoor’s ongoing fascination with the void, offering a masterful balance of presence and absence, materiality and reflection, solidity and ephemerality. Within its elliptical form, only distorted and disorienting reflections remain, transforming the sculpture into an enigmatic portal – a gateway to an alternate universe, simultaneously empty and full. Kapoor’s lifelong exploration of space, and his interrogation of the relationship between interior and exterior, materiality and immateriality, is powerfully encapsulated.
“I stumbled onto the idea that one could make an object that was concave. Suddenly this was not just a camouflaged object; it seemed to be a space full of mirror just like the previous works had been a space full of darkness. That felt like a real discovery. What happened was that it wasn’t just a mirror on a positive form – we have had that experience from Brancusi onwards. This seemed to be a different thing, a different order or object from a mirrored exterior…”
Right: Jeff Koons, Rabbit, 1986. The Broad, Los Angeles. © Jeff Koons
A series that began in the mid-1990s, Untitled exudes an almost celestial elegance, in which the mercurial surface captures and liquefies everything reflected within it. As the viewer’s perspective shifts, these quicksilver reflections undergo dramatic transformations, fracturing into abstract fragments and providing an ever-changing, intangible visual experience. The present work therefore embodies a state of constant flux, where perception is never fixed, but always in motion. Kapoor’s use of the highly polished surface echoes Constantin Brancusi’s innovative approach, yet embarking on a phenomenological encounter with the work, here the act of looking becomes integral to its meaning. The reflective surface invites the viewer into a dialogue with the space it occupies, making perception itself a dynamic and transitory experience. Untitled thus opens up a groundbreaking artistic domain of “new space,” aligning Kapoor with the legacy of Lucio Fontana, whose Spatialism sought to transcend the boundaries of the canvas into another dimension. While Fontana’s slashes and punctures create violent openings into the infinite, Kapoor’s approach is perhaps more subtle and inclusive, drawing the viewer into an immersive spatial experience. Kapoor has long spoken of his search for the “infinite,” famously asserting, “to make new art you have to make a new space” (the artist quoted in Exh. Cat., London, Hayward Gallery, Anish Kapoor, 1998, p. 52). The concept of new space is fully realised in the present work, not as an esoteric abstraction, but as a tangible, accessible experience that invites the viewer into the work’s reflective realm.
Kapoor’s work engages with the philosophical concept of the Sublime, popularised in the Eighteenth century by Edmund Burke, who advocated the contemplation of awe-inducing natural phenomena as a source of creative inspiration. However, Kapoor’s reinterpretation brings the Sublime into a contemporary context, shifting the focus from distant, overwhelming landscapes to the immediate and immersive space before the viewer. Kapoor elaborates: “It seemed it was not a mirrored object but an object full of mirroredness. The spatial questions it seemed to ask were not about deep space but about present space, which I began to think about as a new sublime. If the traditional sublime is in deep space, then this is proposing that the contemporary sublime is in front of the picture plane, not beyond it. I continue to make these works because I feel this is a whole new spatial adventure” (the artist quoted in Exh. Cat., Boston, Institute of Contemporary Art, Anish Kapoor, 2008, p. 52). An object of t.mes less beauty and commanding authority, Untitled relays a warped echo of our world with a t.mes less commanding authority – a prime example of Kapoor’s singular and widely celebrated sculptural practice.