Cave To Cosmos: Mythological Animals In The Sculpture Of Anish Kapoor

ABSTRACT

This paper reflects on the sculpture of Anish Kapoor from an ecocritical perspective, focusing on the significance of non-human animals to his work. His repeated use of motifs related to the flaying of animals in mythology and narratives involving blood, skin, and dismemberment underscores a practice that unsettles humankind’s anthropocentric relationship to animals and the geological world. Drawing on Kapoor’s stated fascination for the cave in his work the paper explores the psychic foundations of art and ways in which Kapoor’s interest in the prehistory of the human species reflects on humanity’s primal albeit often violent disjuncture with its habitat and other animals. Emerging in response to Kapoor’s preoccupation with mythological themes, the significance of non-human animals to Kapoor’s work is not often discussed but from an ecocritical perspective appears seminal to his universe, foregrounding questions relating to art and violence and the representation of animals in human culture.

KEYWORDS:

• Sculpture
• Animal Studies
• Caves, Anish Kapoor

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Images of these, and most of the other works discussed in this essay (i.e. those not already reproduced) can be found at anishkapoor.com.

2. Other places also encrypt this memory and as a figure for the human mind the most obvious is the computer. The search engine Safari suggests a form of knowing predicated on the hunting of animals while real animals in these regions are facing extinction. Fire Fox likewise implies a swift and cunning acquisition of knowledge, while repressing the real condition of foxes in captivity, their bodies flayed for fur and their feet mutilated by the floor of their wire enclosure.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Bridget Sutherland

Bridget Sutherland is a writer and filmmaker. She lectures in visual art at EIT, New Zealand. Her experimental films include Twelve Hours of Daylight, a hand-painted film quoting the eco poetry of Len Lye and William Blake and Miners, by Wilfred Owen, focusing on the internal life of horses during WWI. She has directed a documentary on the British sculptor Anish Kapoor and is currently working on a film about art and animal sentience.