Ooooh … I is skinny!

A lovely friend invited me to the opening of the Anish Kapoor exhibition at the MCA yesterday. I had no idea who Anish Kapoor was, but I don’t get out much so I said yes. It was a media event, featuring a Q&A with the artist and lots of arty farty journalists trying to outdo each other with wanky questions like: “There is a growing reliance on psychic biography in society, which is incredibly oppressive, how can the artist avoid this stifling his work …” or some such ridiculous shite.

Anish asked her to repeat the question, saying he didn’t hear the first bit. But I reckon it was a delaying tactic while he secretly rolled his eyes and thought: I really should become a plumber so I don’t have to be interviewed by any more dreary frickin’ art writers.

There were other questions about how he manages to create work that’s both critically acclaimed and popular and whether he thinks his sculptures resonate differently for people in the country and city, smarty pants stuff like that. I felt a bit sorry for him really. He was really articulate, but why, why why do we expect artists to be philosophers. Does there have to be deeper meaning in everything, can’t it just be about emotion sometimes and how the art makes you feel?

I’m an Anish Kapoor convert because his art made me feel thin. Yep, I’m all class. One of his first works as you enter the exhibition was called Untitled but I have rechristened it “Ooooh, I is SKINNY”. It was this curvy metal thing that when you stood in front of it made you 15 kilograms slimmer. It was AWESOME. I could have admired myself in it all day. I took lots of self portraits, pretending I was taking photos of the artwork …

I had to be dragged away to look at other cool stuff like this …

And this …

And this …

I almost decided Anish was a tosser when I thought he’d left a smear on the wall and called it art …

But then I went over to its wall plaque which announced the work was called “When I am pregnant”. And I was like, huh? Then I looked sideways and saw this …

Pretty cool, huh?

So I’d recommend visiting to the MCA to see Anish’s work. It will give you lots of opportunities to be an art wanker in your own right and wax lyrical about how the black holes are a comment on the growing darkness in society and the mirrored pieces are forcing the viewer to face themselves … or you could just go and enjoy the delicious visual feast. Just make sure you give the kids a stern talking to before they go in because they’ll want to touch everything and they can’t. There are lots of anxious staff who will go nuts – they were having panic attacks and yabbering to each other on walkie-talkies (when they were only two metres apart) during the special viewing for arty farty journalist types.  I can’t even begin to imagine what hundreds of bored kids on school holidays will do to their nerves.