artists & participants

press release only in german

On dit souvent d’un artiste qu’il « renouvelle notre vision d’un sujet » – mais pour Anish Kapoor, il s’agit d’une toute autre dimension : le contact avec ses œuvres renouvelle la vision elle-même, nous faisant, bien au-delà de leur aspect séduisant, nous interroger sur l’acte de « voir ». La vision humaine, que la science ne fait que commencer de découvrir, est un processus complexe et hautement symbolique : en créant constamment des accidents optiques entre le visiteur et l’œuvre, en jouant sur toute la palette et la temporalité des processus cognitifs à l’œuvre dans la perception, en déjouant les évidences, Anish Kapoor nous révèle combien le monde est peuplé par les images mentales que construit notre regard optique, combien la vision est imagination.

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The sheer monumental scale of the Grand Palais provided the inspiration for a big idea: MONUMENTA. For its fourth edition in 2011, MONUMENTA has invited Anish Kapoor, an Indian-born British artist, to challenge the 13,500 m2 of the Nave of the Grand Palais. After guest artists Anselm Kiefer, Richard Serra and Christian Boltanski, it will be the turn of Anish Kapoor to meet the challenge with a brand new work. Born in 1954, Anish Kapoor has been producing powerful, meditative pieces since the 1980s. Making forceful use of the less-is-more principle, his installation-sculptures have a vertiginous, captivating impact on visitors. He uses materials as diverse as polished mirrors, powdered pigments, unsurfaced concrete or fatty wax, to produce forms that are at once organic and minimalist. MONUMENTA marks Anish Kapoor's return to Paris, thirty years after his very first exhibition. His ambition for the Grand Palais is to create an aesthetic and physical shock, a colourful experience that is at once poetic, meditative and stunning, measuring itself against the verticality and light of the Nave, an interior that seems somehow greater than the exterior.

The event is an initiative of the French Ministry of Culture and Communication (Direction générale de la création artistique) and is co-produced by the Centre national des arts plastiques (CNAP), the Grand Palais and the Réunion des musées nationaux. Commissioner: Jean de Loisy

only in german

MONUMENTA 2011 / Anish Kapoor
Kurator: Jean de Loisy
Ort: La nef / The Nave