A BRIEF HISTORY OF ART Poem by Maarja Kangro

In the hot garden of the Peggy
Guggenheim Museum in Venice
stands a sculpture by Anish Kapoor,
a dark grey granite block.

The grey granite
contains two concave circles,
so smooth and shiny
that they look black.

A tanned man in a light shirt,
perhaps a compatriot of Kapoor,
asks whether this is a mirror.
"Magic. A master's hand, I say!"

The man watches himself in the circle:
from a distance, the face appears large,
silly, and close up it's small.
The man laughs and pokes the work again.

„Look! Just look." He shakes his head,
laughs and stoops over
the big black circles.
Then he's serious again.

„It makes me sick.
Makes me dizzy.
It makes me throw up, booaah!"
And then he leaves.