“As artists we have no choice but to look into the darkness. If Plato in the myth of the cave tells of how men evolve by discovering light, Freud instead tells us to look into the depth of the cave, where there is darkness, darkness, terror. Darkness, the great intuition of the Viennese psychoanalyst, is the place that the artist must explore today more than ever” Anish Kapoor

Conceived for the exhibition event held in Venice, at the Gallerie dell’Accademia and at Palazzo Manfrin from April 20 to October 9, the volume constructs a broad and comprehensive retrospective that presents the key moments in the artist’s career and explores the development of his unique visual language, retracing the steps from the beginnings to the latest, pioneering research.

The monograph also includes the newest and unpublished highly innovative works, created through carbon nanotechnology, as well as the recent paintings and sculptures that testify to the vitality and visionary nature of Kapoor’s current practice.

Considered one of the most influential contemporary artists, Anish Kapoor (Bombay, 1954) has always explored the liminal space occupied by an object, something that is present but at the same time absent, empty but full. Among his most famous works is Descent into Limbo from 1992, which creates a frightening black void in the floor of the exhibition hall. His experiments with the blackest possible color, Kapoor Black, the special black pigment that absorbs up to 99,99 percent of light, are also famous. These are works of which it is not possible to perceive the depth, and therefore the difference between full and empty, these recurring themes in Kapoor’s research.

The volume, introduced by the preface by the director of Gallerie dell’Accademia of Venice, Giulio Manieri Elia, and by the curator of the exhibition Taco Dibbits and a wide photographic selection of the main works of Kapoor, is enriched by essays and insights by

Gil Anidjar, Homi K. Bhabha, Linda Borean, Giuseppe Civitarese, Mario Codognato, Waldemar Januszczak, Norman Rosenthal, Carlo Rovelli e Michele Tavola.

Homi K. Bhabha provides a philosophical reading of the works, Linda Borean tells the story of Palazzo Manfrin and the Gallerie dell’Accademia between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Giuseppe Civitarese focuses on the monochromatic colors that predominate in Kapoor’s works, such as red and black, which represent proto-sensations and proto -emotions. Mario Codognato presents the Manfrin Project and an excursus of the artist’s work, while Waldemar Januszczak defines Kapoor Mister In-Between, given that his work is played on the impossible coexistence of absence and presence, empty and full, Norman Rosenthal tells the artist’s works with references and comparisons to other very famous works by Piranesi and Rembrant,
Carlo Rovelli highlights, from the point of view of the scientist, Kapoor’s new way of experiencing and seeing the things, Michele Tavola connects Kapoor’s works with the masterpieces shown at Gallerie dell’Accademia.