Review

ANISH KAPOOR – at The Museum of Contemporary Art Australia

This unique exhibition, which is the first major
presentation of the artist’s work in Australia, includes works
from the early stages of Kapoor’s career to the present day.
It explores the artist’s continual experimentation across
a variety of materials including clay, plastic, pigment,
steel and wax to create works of great visual power and
emotional impact.
Highlights include one of the artist’s most ambitious
works for a gallery, Memory (2008), commissioned by
Deutsche Bank in consultation with the Solomon R.
Guggenheim Foundation for the Deutsche Guggenheim. In
the work’s first presentation in the Southern Hemisphere,
Memory completely fills the MCA’s sizable Level 3 Gallery
as if squeezed between the white walls. Viewers experience
the rust-coloured bulbous structure from several angles
including a window that looks into the cavernous interior
space. By restricting the ability to view the whole work from
a single point, Kapoor challenges the public to imagine the
object in its entirety by piecing together memories of the
work from different locations.