EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW – “If this act of vandalism says something, it speaks more than a certain intolerance that appears in France of art whatsoever,” says the artist Anglo India.
“What a tragedy! How sad! “, We simply responds Anish Kapoor, the guest artist of Versailles this summer. The armed peace lasted little time after the violent controversy that arose around his revolutionary works, even before their official opening on 7 June. The Anglo-Indian artist, born in 1954 in Mumbai, a figure of the British scene since the 1970s, meets us at midnight, just returned from the fair Art Basel finally quiet of his London home. No glowing anger at the French denouncing vandalism Wednesday morning of his monumental installation, Dirty Corner , asked after weeks of logistical feats in the Tapis Vert Le Nôtre. A sorry temper and an abyss of reflections. “You have to put this in some perspective. If this act of vandalism says something, it speaks more than a certain intolerance appeared in France that art whatsoever. The problem seems to me more political than anything else, it refers to a very minor fraction which was told why any creative act is an endangerment of a past sacred to the extreme to designs which have nothing artistic. I hope it is only a small group whose voice overlaps that of most others. I find this sad phenomenon of nuisance. ”
Being baptized Dirty Corner of vulgar Vagina Queen is a way to belittle my work, to make art at insults.
Crime of treason? “I never used the words from which was born the controversy,” repeats Anish Kapoor. “I never said” The Queen “, I referred to” Her “or” She “to describe a form that could be feminine, lying on the grass, like an Egyptian queen or a sphinx. Being baptized Dirty Corner of a vulgar Vagina Queen is a way to belittle my work, to make art at the insults, dirty my work and associate it with words offensive to easy and immediate rejection. These are not my words, this is also not the way I think, I explained again and again, especially during the press conference on June 5 at Versailles to a full house (zero scandal, only two questions: direct the British daily The Independent on the origin of the expression in question, another weighted, the French daily Cross on the will cause or not, Ed). “I do not seek provocation. So I refuse categorically that we associate Dirty Corner to the work of the American artist Paul McCarthy, sexually explicit and claimed as such ( Tree , defined according to the artist himself as a “butt plug” giant inflatable and pine green, installed Vendôme during the last FIAC, vandalized and removed immediately, Ed). This combination of two worlds that have nothing to do is absurd, ridiculous and malicious. This is making the poor psychology to get married by the scandal. ”
“I notice some discomfort in this country that I love, I love the heritage and language”
“Remove the yellow paint Corten steel necessarily imply to remove the patina that gives color rust Dirty Corner . It is therefore impossible in situ “according to the artist Photo credit:. Kamil Zihnioglu / AP
The lack of a stranger, an intruder in the heart of the royal domain of France? “I do not think it’s a racist act. I am a foreigner in France, for sure, but I’m also in the UK, “replies Sir Anish Kapoor, knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2013.” I think that at least 8% to 10% French are not native French. They come from all over the world. Like artists who bring their questions, their forms, metaphors, language. I can not judge their feelings at all. But I notice some discomfort in this country that I love, I love the heritage and language. This unease has come to punish an object, a pure object, which has no word to defend himself. This is also the positive aspect of this violent and negative history: blind vandalism proves the power of art that intrigues, mind, moves limits. If we had wanted to emphasize its symbolic significance, it’s done like never before. I do not like the word metaphysics, but it has more power in a work of art that can be seen. The positive thing of this attack is that it highlights the creative force of an inanimate object. ”
What future for tomorrow Dirty Corner “it took up with a huge logistics? “The damage is significant. We only know that the vandals came early Wednesday morning with large amounts of paint. There are cameras everywhere in Versailles. I hope they will be identified, “we replied Anish Kapoor, without any excess. “Remove the yellow paint Corten steel necessarily imply to remove the patina that gives color rust Dirty Corner . It is therefore not possible in situ. I do not know if I have to disassemble or leave as is, I’ll think about it. There has long Documenta (High Mass of contemporary art, which meets every 7 years in Kassel, in the heart of Germany, Ed), a work by Joseph Beuys – stacked rocks – had been vandalized , painted in pink, some with rabbit graffiti. Beuys returned the attack by using this rabbit graffiti in other later works. That is the power of art than to seek a solution. “
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