I want to make a phenomenon: Sir Anish Kapoor

Sir Anish Kapoor, the celebrated British sculptor of Indian origin who was awarded knighthood last year for his contribution to the visual arts, is in Kochi to create an original work of art for the first time in India.

Every installation made by this London-based sculptor is celebrated all over the world by art aficionados. His fame literally touched the sky two years ago when he made Britain’s largest piece of public art, called ArcelorMittal Orbit, a 376-foot structure, as a tribute to the London Olympics.

He also holds the distinction of being the first living artist to have a solo exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts.

Even as he works shoulder to shoulder with 30 assistants and battles a fragile power system to put in place a man-made whirlpool at Aspinwall in Fort Kochi, one of the venues of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, he spares some time to answer questions, pose for pictures, laugh heartily and swat the notorious Kochi mosquitoes.

“I have shown my works before in India, but working on something new is always risky because you don’t know whether it is going to work or not,” says Sir Anish, before going on to discuss certain basic strands of his art practice.

“I don’t make art about myself. It is less personal and more fundamental. Somewhere along the way I came across this idea that while the sculpture is about the material, it is also about the immaterial, not only the object, but also about the non-object.

I am interested in shiny objects, like steel, because it has this non-object quality. Even when I use rougher material, I keep going between material and non-material.”

Giving us a sneak preview of Descencion, the water vortex that he is setting up, he explains that it is the result of an idea that took birth in his mind a quarter century ago.

“I never had the right equipment or the right situation to make it. It seems a good situation here. I am not interested in making art. I want to make a phenomenon, something that goes right to the centre of the Earth with real force.”

He explains further: “It is not something that you can see only in aesthetic terms. When you propose something like that it has to be unbelievably good.

Otherwise it is just a sham. Part of being good is for it to have certain violence. When it spins, making that form, pulling the water into itself, it is very aggressive. It evokes a certain sense of fear. You take part in it, but at the same time you lose yourself for a second.”

Talking about the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, he says, “This is the only real contemporary event of its kind in India. At that level, it has my wholehearted support.

We have our old culture, but we are not so good at contemporary. We don’t trust it, we don’t believe in it, we hardly practice it, and in culture, it is invisible in India. I think that is such a shame.

There are no national institutions that support contemporary culture. So this kind of event that is done by artists for artists with almost no government money is laudable.”

He may have settled down in England and been knighted by the British, but Sir Anish insists that he knows ‘where his heart is’.

“If it was possible not to give up my Indian nationality, I wouldn’t have. But India does not allow dual citizenship. I travel almost every week, so if you have an Indian passport, it is an absolute nightmare to get visas!”