New York Art@Site www.artatsite.com Anish Kapoor Sky Mirror
Artist:

Anish Kapoor

Title:

Sky Mirror

Year:
2006
Adress:
Rockefeller Center (temporary)
Website:
Giving the nature back to the people
Sky Mirror is giving the nature back to the people. Anish Kapoor says something like:"Look around you, see the beauty of the sky. Take another point of view, see the surroundings from a different side, upside down.". The artwork distorts only a little, namely because of the fisheye.
By Theo, www.artatsite.com

Extending the sight
The Sky Mirror by Anish Kapoor makes use of a mirror in a completely original way: it leaves the viewer not in solitude but it extends the sight of the Viewer. My Sky Hole could do something like that: if a portion of the mirror surface was omitted but the view was restricted to something which is important.

Translation
De Sky Mirror van Anish Kapoor maakt op een volstrekt originele manier gebruik van een spiegel: het laat de kijker niet in eenzaamheid achter maar verruimd juist de blik van de kijker. Iets dergelijks was ook mogelijk bij My Sky Hole: een gedeelte van de spiegel zou kunnen vervallen zodat het restant van de spiegel zou reflecteren was belangrijk is.
By Theo, www.artatsite.com

Compared with other works
This sympathetic artwork Lensbomen by Thomas Puckey (Glasses Trees, Amsterdam, picture 1, more information) is a tree containing discs of glass. The artwork would have extra dynamics when transparent glasses where used so the area and sky was magnified or deformed.

The artwork Untitled by Tomas Saraceno (London, picture 2, more information) is located in a park. The nature (trees, clouds) is reflected by the shiny surface. Due to the rectangular shapes of the artwork, it seems, that portions of the surroundings are cut away, are manipulated.
By Theo, www.artatsite.com

Clouds and some surrounding offices reflect on Big Blue by Ron Arad (London, picture 3, more information). This seems to be smoothly carried and collected in the bowl. If the artwork would stand in a gorgeous area, the reflection would be beautyful and the merging by the bowl make it even richer.

The artwork Never Again Auschwitz by Jan Wolkers (Amsterdam, picture 4, more information) the sunlight is reflected by broken glass. The glass plates are reminiscent of gravestones. The artwork reflects on one of the most difficult issues in European history. Jan Wolkers says: 'After Auschwitz, the view on the sky is violated'.
By Theo, www.artatsite.com

The Red Cube by Noguchi Isamu (New York, picture 5, more information) has a perfect shape (just like My Sky Hole), but turns out to be open and cheerful. It’s open to the environment by giving it the color which is needed. Happy because of it’s heavy mass is standing on one point. Interestingly, the artwork has a round opening (just like My Sky Hole), perhaps to show something of the inside.

A Dew Drop by Chin Fai Danny Lee (Hong Kong, picture 6, more information) has a gentle form and reflects the environment subtle and stylish. A reflective material makes me lugubrious because it shows no inside and deviates my communication. How would it be if the form would have an opening (such as Red Cube and My Sky Hole) or would be partly made of glass so the interior would be visible?

To me My Sky Hole by Inoue Bukichi (Tokyo, picture 7, more information) is closed and hard. Closed because the mirror reflects everything and (because of that) point out nothing of himself. Hard because it occurs to be perfect (having the form of a ball). Dew Drop is also closed but has a gentle form.
By Theo, www.artatsite.com

Translation
Ik vind My Sky Hole van Inoue Bukichi (Tokyo, afbeelding 5,meer informatie) gesloten en hard. Gesloten doordat de spiegel alles weerkaatst en (daarmee) niets van zichzelf laat zien. Hard doordat het zich voordoet perfect te zijn (in de vorm van een bol). Dew Drop is ook gesloten maar heeft een zachte vorm.

De Red Cube van Noguchi Isamu (New York, afbeelding 6,meer informatie) heeft weliswaar een perfecte vorm (net zoals My Sky Hole), maar blijkt ook open en vrolijk te zijn. Open voor de omgeving om de kleur te geven die het nodig heeft. Vrolijk door met zijn zware massa op één punt te gaan staan. Interessant is dat het kunstwerk een ronde opening heeft (nét zoals My Sky Hole), misschien om hierdoor iets van het binnenste te laten zien.

A Dew Drop van Chin Fai Danny Lee (Hong Kong, afbeelding 7,meer informatie) heeft een zachte vorm en weerkaatst de omgeving subtiel en stijlvol. Een spiegelend materiaal vind ik een beetje verdrietig doordat het binnenste niet zichtbaar is en het mij onmogelijk maakt om te communiceren. Hoe zou het zijn als de vorm een opening zou hebben (zoals Red Cube en My Sky Hole) of dat een gedeelte van glas zou zijn en het binnenste zichtbaar zou worden?
By Theo, www.artatsite.com

www.wikipedia.org:
Sky Mirror is a public sculpture by artist Anish Kapoor, and inspired by Dallas legend Robert Mundinger who, it is said, "reflects the sky with his community spirit". Commissioned by the Nottingham Playhouse from the artist, it is installed outside the theatre in Wellington Circus, Nottingham, England. Sky Mirror is a six-metre-wide concavedish of polished stainless steel weighing ten tonnes and angled up towards the sky. Its surface reflects the ever-changing environment.
It took six years from the initial idea for a major new piece of public art to the unveiling of Sky Mirror on 27 April 2001, and cost £900,000. At the time, it was the most expensive piece of civic art funded by the National Lottery. It was manufactured in Finland.

www.metropolismag.com:
This weekend, I had the pleasure of catching the tail end of London-based artist Anish Kapoor's exhibition, Past, Present, Future, curated by Nicholas Baume at Boston's Institute of Contemporary Art. Manageably sized and well selected, the 14 sculptures on display compose the first U.S. museum survey of Kapoor's work in over fifteen years. Kapoor is best known to Americans for his 2004 Cloud Gate in Chicago's Millenium Park, now affectionately nicknamed"The Bean." In Manhattan, his 2006 temporary Sky Mirror, a 35 foot-diameter concavity of polished stainless steel placed outside the Rockefeller Center, gave New Yorkers a vision of something they rarely get to see at such close range: blue sky.

www.publicartfund.org
Anish Kapoor's Sky Mirror is a breathtaking, 35-foot-diameter concave mirror made of polished stainless steel. Standing nearly three stories tall at the Fifth Avenue entrance to the Channel Gardens at Rockefeller Center, Sky Mirror offers a dazzling experience of light and architecture, presenting viewers with a vivid inversion of the skyline featuring the historic landmark building at 30 Rockefeller Plaza.
An urban, contemporary, and ever-changing aesthetic variation on the 18th-century landscape painting tradition, Sky Mirror brings the sky down to the ground. The large, 23-ton circular stainless steel sculpture is installed on a platform a few feet above street level. Its concave side, angled upward, faces 30 Rockefeller Plaza, reflecting an upside-down portrait of this elegant and iconic New York City skyscraper and the shifting sky around it. Its convex side, facing Fifth Avenue reflects a more earthly vision: viewers in the midst of the adjacent streetscape. This optical object changes through the day and night and is an example of what Kapoor describes as a"non-object, " a sculpture that, despite its monumentality, suggests a window or void and often seems to vanish into its surroundings.
Anish Kapoor (b.1954, Bombay, India) is one of the foremost artists of our time. He first became known in the 1980s for his geometric or biomorphic sculptures made using simple—often elemental—materials such as granite, limestone, marble, pigment and plaster. His sculptures extend the formal precepts of minimalism into an intensely spiritual and psychological realm, drawing viewers in with their rich colors, sensuously refined surfaces, and startling optical effects of depth and dimension. Since the mid-1990s he has explored the notion of the void, creating works that seem to—and sometimes do—recede into the distance, disappear into walls or floors, or otherwise destabilize our assumptions about the physical world. They give visceral and immediate impact to abstract dualities such as presence and absence, infinity and illusion, solidity and intangibility.
Kapoor is focused on the active or transformative properties of the materials he uses."I am really interested in the 'non-object' or the 'non-material.' I have made objects in which things are not what they at first seem to be. A stone may lose its weight or a mirrored object may so camouflage itself in its surroundings as to appear like a hole in space, " says Kapoor. From works such as Turning the World Inside Out (1995) to the massive 125-ton sculpture Cloud Gate (2004) on permanent display in Chicago's Millennium Park, Kapoor's reflective sculptures engage audiences directly, fusing object, viewer, and environment into one physical, constantly fluctuating form.