Anish Kapoor: Monte Sant’Angelo Metro Station in Naples

The Monte Sant’Angelo metro station in Naples, designed by Anish Kapoor, is inaugurated after more than twenty years of planning and construction. Invited in 2003 to envision a station for the Traiano district, Kapoor conceived a project that was from the outset both artistic and architectural, combining monumentality with symbolic depth. The new stop is part of Line 7, distinct from the celebrated Line 1 “Stazioni dell’Arte”.

Construction began in 2008 but was beset by financial and logistical setbacks. The monumental corten steel entrance, commissioned in 2005 at a cost of around ten million euros, was shipped from the Netherlands in 2015 but delayed for almost a year due to disputes. Kapoor at one point threatened to repurchase the work to prevent the project’s collapse. Finally installed in 2017, it was joined in 2022 by a second tubular structure on viale Traiano.

The station, serving the Monte Sant’Angelo university campus, represents a crucial infrastructural link, connecting Cumana and Circumflegrea railways with Fuorigrotta and Soccavo. For Kapoor, the design embodies a fusion of sculpture and architecture, where form reshapes the perception of body and landscape. The two entrances mirror one another: one raw, earthy, descending; the other smooth, tubular, ascending.

Inside, developed with Jan Kaplický and Amanda Levete of Future Systems, the rough walls of the tunnels are preserved, offering an immersive and porous experience. Kapoor describes the project as an engagement with myth and landscape: “In the city of Vesuvius and in Dante’s mythical entry to Hell, I felt it was important to confront the true meaning of going underground.”