Cloud Gate in Millennium Park

“CLOUD GATE”

In Chicago’s Millennium Park

This is one of the most impressive pieces of art I have ever seen! Its placement is such that you can see Chicago’s downtown skyline and the clouds above in its reflection with the expansive Millennium Park as its true background. Visitors can walk beneath its 12-foot-high arch and touch its mirror-like surface. Depending on where you stand, your reflection will offer a variety of perspectives. It is so much fun to photograph!

This piece is British artist Anish Kapoor's first public outdoor work installed in the United States. It is a 110-ton elliptical sculpture forged of a seamless series of highly polished stainless steel plates. The piece is inspired by liquid mercury, the sculpture is among the largest of its kind in the world, measuring 66-feet long by 33-feet high.

“What I wanted to do in Millennium Park is make something that would engage the Chicago skyline…so that one will see the clouds kind of floating in, with those very tall buildings reflected in the work. And then, since it is in the form of a gate, the participant, the viewer, will be able to enter into this very deep chamber that does, in a way, the same thing to one's reflection as the exterior of the piece is doing to the reflection of the city around.”
-Anish Kapoor

Click here for a link to more of Kapoor’s art pieces.

Click here for a link to Chicago's Millennium Park.

photograph by:

© Elizabeth Stuckey 2009