Even for an artist as established and celebrated as Anish Kapoor, the prospect of exhibiting in the gardens of the Palace of Versailles must have been slightly unnerving. How to create anything as impressive as the grounds themselves, which cover 800 hectares and have paid witness to some of history’s most defining moments? How to match the scale, grandeur and cultural significance?
Three-and-a-half centuries in the making, the gardens of Versailles were first conceptualised in 1661, when Louis XIV commissioned André Le Nôtre to come up with a design and layout. The long-reigning French king was of the firm belief that the grounds were just as important as the palace itself.
The palace, which has been on Unesco’s World Heritage List for three decades, started its life as a hunting lodge belonging to Louis XIII; his son saw fit to transform it into something rather grander. In 1682, Louis XIV moved his court and government to Versailles, and each of the three French kings who lived there subsequently made their own improvements – until the French Revolution broke out and highlighted the pitfalls of such whimsical endeavours.
It took 40 years to complete the garden, which was developed in tandem with the palace. Le Nôtre worked with a number of other experts – Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the superintendent of the king’s buildings; Charles Le Brun, the first painter of the king who produced the drawings for a large number of the statues and fountains; and the architect Jules Hardouin-Mansart, who was responsible for building the Orangerie. Covering three hectares and divided into six sections of lawn and a circular pool, the Orangerie Paterre is home to more than 1,000 trees, including palms, oleander, pomegranate, eugenias and, naturally, orange trees. At its heart sits a 150-metre central vaulted gallery – during Louis XIV’s reign, this space was home to sculptures that have since been moved to the Louvre.
Creating the gardens in the 1600s involved masses of work and thousands of men. Tonnes of earth had to be shifted to make way for the flower beds, the Orangerie, the intricate fountains and the canal. A space previously consisting of woodland, grassland and marshes was transformed in to a garden befitting of Louis XIV’s extravagant, awe-inspiring palace.
Today, there are countless walks, copses and groves, including the Enceladus Grove, home to the Enceladus Fountain, created by the sculptor Gaspard Marsy between 1675 and 1677 to depict the myth of the fall of the Titans. Fountains play a major role in the overall design, highlighting the popularity of water in French-style gardens. The palace’s entire east-west perspective is dominated by the Grand Canal, which is 1,670 metres long and took 11 years to construct.
Catherine Pégard, the president of the Palace of Versailles, was responsible for selecting Kapoor to show a major contemporary art exhibition in the gardens for this year’s summer season. The palace has been inviting high-profile artists to exhibit here since 2008, and Kapoor follows on from such names as Giuseppe Penone, Lee Ufan, Jeff Koons, Takashi Murakami and Joana Vasconcelos.
Pégard recalls the first time Kapoor visited the grounds to discuss the collaboration. “We were walking with Anish Kapoor, at a brisk step, with long land-surveyor’s strides. Our long walk unfolded in a silence only interrupted by a few words about Le Nôtre, born on March 12, like Anish Kapoor – a small nod to history. When it finally came to an end, Anish Kapoor asked to think things over. How unnerving for us. What humility from an artist used to the grandest sites.”
Born in Mumbai in 1954, Kapoor moved to London in 1973 and studied at the Hornsey College of Art and the Chelsea School of Art. It's fitting that his first solo exhibition took place in France, in 1980. Since then, he has become known for his monumental works – among them Leviathan, which was presented at Paris's Grand Palais in 2011, as part of the Monumenta project; Marsyas at the Tate Modern; Ark Nova, his inflatable, mobile concert hall; and Orbit, which was created for the 2012 London Olympic Games.
A year after his stroll with Pégard, Kapoor presented his plans for the gardens of Versailles. Kapoor Versailles, which kicked off last month and runs until November 1, features a total of six works – some new, some existing. They are bold, vivid, controversial and often unsettling, as in the case of Shooting into the Corner, which is to be found in the Royal Tennis Court, or Salle du Jeu de Paume, and consists predominantly of thick, blood-coloured wax that's evocative of human remains. Kapoor himself has said: "I do not want to make sculpture about form – I wish to make sculpture about belief, or about passion, about experience."
It’s worth nothing this is the first time that a contemporary artist has ever displayed an installation in this symbolic room. While it was once dedicated to an early form of tennis, the Jeu de Paume was also the site of the founding act of French democracy, when on June 20, 1789, following the French Revolution, representatives from the nobility, clergy and “third estate” converged here to form France’s first constitution.
Kapoor's other pieces are to be found outside: C-Curve is on the Terrace; Sky Mirror is in the Water Garden; Dirty Corner is in the so-called Grand Perspective; Descension is at the Fountain of Apollo's Chariot Lawn; and the awkwardly named Sectional Body Preparing for Monadic Singularity is to be found in the Star Grove.
“For Anish Kapoor, a work of art doesn’t exist alone, but through its viewer,” says Pégard. “The visitor at Versailles will witness the dualities of the artist’s work: heaven and Earth, visible and invisible, inside and outside, shadow and light … This universe can be read through experience and imagination.
“The originality of this exhibition, what makes it unique, even to those who have long been familiar with Kapoor’s work around the world, is that in Versailles his vision meets an imagination set in stone by history. The very controlled landscape of Versailles is drawn into instability. The grounds become uncertain and moving. Waters swirl. Romantic ruins take hold of the Tapis Vert. Exposed interior orifices are hidden within the garden’s labyrinths. The mirrors that are so central to Versailles now distort it. This world is perhaps about to tip over.
“It is not by chance that Anish Kapoor was the first to push open the door to the Jeu de Paume, which he considers as a work of art in itself, to exhibit his installation. Anish Kapoor draws us into a hidden history, within the boundaries of Versailles.”
• Kapoor Versailles runs until November 1. Access is free, except on Tuesdays, Saturdays and Sundays, when the Musical Fountains Show takes place at the palace. The gardens are open every day from 8am to 8.30pm, except on Saturdays until September 19, and on October 25 and November 1, when they close at 5.30pm.
• The Jeu de Paume room is open from Tuesdays to Sundays, from 2pm to 6pm. Entrance is free.
For more information, visits en.chateauversailles.fr.
Green Spaces is a series that features notable gardens and public spaces from around the world.
sdenman@thenational.ae