Imagine a red steel tower that twists like a tangled rope. It stands beside an Olympic stadium. Millions of visitors walked past it in 2012.
That tower is the ArcelorMittal Orbit. It was designed by the Indian-born sculptor Anish Kapoor. This lesson explains how it was planned, paid for and built. It also shows why people argued about it.
Commission: a job where someone pays an artist to make a work. A city may ask a sculptor for a monument. The artist then designs it for that place. Kapoor called the Orbit the commission of a lifetime.
Public sculpture: art placed outdoors where anyone can see it. A statue in a park is one example. People meet it as they go about their day. The Orbit was made for the crowds of the Olympic Park.
Structural designer: an expert who works out how a big structure can stand safely. A bridge needs one, and so does a tall tower. They check the shape, the steel and the loads. Cecil Balmond played this part on the Orbit.
Observation tower: a tall structure built so visitors can look out over a city. People go up by lift or stairs. They see far from a high floor. The Orbit gives views of up to 20 miles.
What Is the ArcelorMittal Orbit?
Why was it built?
In March 2010 a spiralling sculpture by Anish Kapoor was chosen as the monument for the London 2012 Olympic Games. Kapoor had already won the Turner Prize.
The tower stands in the Olympic Park, between the Olympic Stadium and the Aquatics Centre. Its design includes the five Olympic rings.
Visitors can climb it for wide views over the Stratford site in east London.
Sources: BBC News (2010): Kapoor chosen · BBC News (2010): site and views.
Check 1
The Orbit is taller than the Statue of Liberty.
How big is it?
The tower is about 115 m tall, which is 22 m higher than the Statue of Liberty. At its opening it was called the tallest sculpture in the UK, more than twice the height of Nelson’s Column.
Here are the main figures.
- 35 storeys, with a lift for going up.
- 455 steps in the spiral staircase for walking down.
- Two observation floors and a restaurant.
- 18 months to build.
- 2,000 tonnes of steel, of which 60% was recycled.
Sources: BBC News (2012): Orbit preview · BBC News (2010): height comparison.
Who Paid for the Orbit?
How did the cost change?
The first design cost £19.1 million. Steel company ArcelorMittal, owned by Lakshmi Mittal, agreed to fund up to £16 million. The London Development Agency added £3.1 million.
By late 2010 the projected cost had risen to £22.3 million. ArcelorMittal then provided £19.2 million, and the agency kept its £3.1 million.
The idea began at a chance meeting between Boris Johnson and Lakshmi Mittal. It happened in a cloakroom at the 2009 World Economic Forum in Davos.
Sources: BBC News (2010): revised cost · BBC News (2010): who paid.
| Stage | Cost | Who paid |
|---|---|---|
| Plan, March 2010 | £19.1 million | ArcelorMittal up to £16m; London Development Agency £3.1m |
| Revised, late 2010 | £22.3 million | ArcelorMittal £19.2m; London Development Agency £3.1m |
| Opening, 2012 | £22.7 million | Named as the cost in the 2012 preview |
Check 2
ArcelorMittal’s share of the cost rose from £16 million to £19.2 million.
When did the public get to climb it?
Building work began in late 2010. The tower opened to Olympic crowds on 28 July 2012. During the Games a ticket cost £15 for adults and £7 for children.
Kapoor admitted the adult price was a hell of a lot of money. It was meant to become a full-time ticketed attraction at Easter 2014, after the park reopened.
Planners hoped for one million visitors a year.
Sources: BBC News (2012): tickets and opening · BBC News (2010): building begins.
Why Does It Look So Twisted?
Who helped shape it?
Kapoor worked with the structural designer Cecil Balmond of the engineering firm Arup. A sculpture this tall needs both art and engineering.
They were inspired by giant constructions such as the biblical Tower of Babel. They imagined a single rope-like strand made of 366 steel elements, looping up and down.
Instead of a cone with a wide base, it looks like a mesh cage that bends and twists. Balmond called the result a form on the edge of stability.
Sources: New York Times ArtsBeat: how it was designed · BBC News (2010): the design team.
What did Kapoor want it to say?
Kapoor said he wanted to make a kind of deconstruction of the tower. Towers are almost always symmetrical, he noted. The Orbit’s twisted loops were a refusal of a singular image.
He also said it refuses to be an emblem. For him, that is why it feels unsettling.
So the odd shape is deliberate, not a mistake.
Sources: BBC News (2012): Kapoor on the design · New York Times ArtsBeat: design idea.
Check 3
The Orbit has the classic cone shape of a tower, with a wide base and narrow top.
Why Did People Disagree About It?
Who liked it and who did not?
The design split opinion from the start. Early nicknames included the Colossus of Stratford and the Hubble Bubble.
Critics were harsh. Some called it the Eiffel Tower after a nuclear attack. Others called it a catastrophic collision between two cranes.
Kapoor accepted this. He said some would hate it and some would love it, and that was fine.
Sources: New York Times ArtsBeat: early nicknames · BBC News (2012): critics and Kapoor.
Check 4
Kapoor said the £15 ticket was a bargain.
How Did Indian Art Spaces Meet Kapoor?
Where does India come in?
The National Gallery of Modern Art in New Delhi hosted a guided walk in its Anish Kapoor Galleries on 17 February 2011. The curator Nancy Adajania led it.
She discussed the mix of the philosophical and the playful in his work. She also questioned the tired choice between national identity and international location.
A BBC Imagine documentary on Kapoor (2011) also appears in a film programme listed by the same gallery.
Sources: NGMA Delhi: guided walk notice · NGMA film festival synopsis.
What should you remember for exams?
Keep these points ready.
- Who: Anish Kapoor, Turner Prize winner, with Cecil Balmond.
- What: ArcelorMittal Orbit, London 2012 Olympic monument.
- Size: about 115 m, 22 m above the Statue of Liberty.
- Cost: first £19.1 million, later £22.3 million.
- Style: 366 steel elements looped like a rope.
Sources: BBC News (2010): key facts · New York Times ArtsBeat: key facts.
MCQ on Anish Kapoor and the ArcelorMittal Orbit
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