Anish Kapoor: Gathering Clouds

Kukje Gallery presents an exhibition of recent works by the internationally renowned artist, Anish Kapoor. Titled “Gathering Clouds”, the exhibition will showcase sculptures that reflect his mastery of formal investigation and material science. This will be his third exhibition at the gallery following previous shows in 2003 and 2008. Spanning two gallery spaces, K1 and K3, the exhibit will include two unique yet related body of works that together further cement his reputation as a fearless interlocutor of materials and conceptual rigor.

The first and primary grouping of works is a series of his new and widely praised “twist” sculptures (2016) shown in K1. Fabricated from stainless steel, these powerful works demand attention as they exhibit how force applied to mass can be captured as a manifestation of arrested movement. The artist has referred to similar bodies of work in a larger scale as “Non-Objects” (2013-2014), alluding to the in-between state where the internal geometry of a thing and its surface combine to interrupt the object’s legibility, conspiring in its own disappearance. Installed in K3, these precise formsare held in suspended animation, their volume offset by the lightness and tensile fragility of their polished surface.

In addition to the twists, Kapoor will show the work “Gathering Clouds” (2014) in K1. Titled sequentially I to IV, it consists of wall-mounted and pigment-coated fiberglass discs—a concave form often explored by the artist such as in his celebrated work Sky Mirror at the Rockefeller Center, New York(2006)—­that evoke a mysterious, unfathomable darkness. These powerful and poetic shapes resist easy interpretation, alternating the focus on surface and depth, exploring the emotional contours of whoever is looking at them. By skillfully balancing surfaces with expertly manipulated geometrical forms and colors, the artist is able to manipulate space, thereby, inducing a physical and emotional experience in the viewer.