Mountain/What is the Way Up?: A literary exploration of Anish Kapoor's sculpture (The Art Monographs)

The Art Monographs, a new series from Sylph Editions, juxtapose works of art with literary writing. Informative, evocative, and associative, these lavishly produced texts are a compelling interaction between word and image. In these pages, photographs detailing Anish Kapoor’s vast aluminium sculpture Mountain are considered alongside a three-part theatrical piece by Naveen Kishore entitled What is the Way Up? Made of 120 individual layers of aluminium, the sloping sides of Kapoor’s Mountain evoke the natural process of formation by erosion, but also serve as testimony to the sophisticated technology underlying its construction. The assembled whole invites the spectator to partake in a contemplative journey as Kishore’s characters react and respond to the supernatural presence of Kapoor’s Mountain, expressing their anguish and surprise at the sculpture’s scale, texture, and elusive curves. An electrifying clash of fluid and frothy prose cast against Kapoor’s metal monumentalism, this is a striking and memorable introduction to an extraordinary new series.