Olympic sculpture gets cool reception
An artistic tower costing £22.5 million was unveiled yesterday to commemorate the Olympics being held in London this year. Critics have questioned the need to spend so much money on the tallest sculpture in the world at a time when the government is making such large scale cuts to pensions, health and social services.
Designed by Anish Kapoor, the steel structure called Orbit depicts the five rings of the Olympics and will charge adult visitors £15 for getting a lift to the 35th floor and descending its steps on the way down.
The building itself seems like it could become another herring of the Dome variety after critics slammed it on its opening with one design expert calling it “a contorted mass of entrails”.
Costing an amount similar to some of the stadiums themselves, it is already being slated as an inappropriate modernist experiment.
Kapoor said he liked his work to be controversial: “The Eiffel Tower was hated by everybody for 50 years, or something like that,” he explained. “Now it’s a mainstay of how we understand Paris. We’ll see what happens here. But discomfort’s ok.”
Discomfort is an understatement for some of those whose protests against the Olympics have been heavily seized on by Olympics officials. At the Leyton Marshes protest camp, several people were arrested by the police as they tried to point out the unnecessary building of a basketball court in the middle of a well-used green area in East London.
Expect more delays and a reduction of citizens’ rights when the Olympics hit London and a combined force of police, army and security guards numbering nearly 50,000 swarm our streets.
The editorial unit
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