The Anish Kapoor sculpture that was discarded as rubbish

London, March 18: In what some will see as an extreme form of artistic criticism, a worker in a storage company in London had an object made from polystyrene, cement and earth chucked into a builder’s skip thinking it was, well, just rubbish.

On Friday, the company, Fine Arts Logistics, was ordered by a high court judge to pay £351,375 in compensation plus legal costs on top for the object that was thrown out was Hole and Vessel II, a valued Anish Kapoor sculpture made in 1984.

Indian-born Kapoor, 52, one of Britain’s most successful sculptors, expressed his sadness at the loss when the storage firm first discovered the sculpture had gone missing.

It was made during Kapoor’s transitional phase when he was “moving away from an exploration of the male/female dichotomy towards an exploration of the void”.

“It’s an important work in terms of what I was up to then,” explained Kapoor, who represented Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1990 and was awarded the Turner Prize in 1991. “I only made seven or eight works that year and it’s a shame to lose one of them.”

He acknowledged: “Works have to go out in the world and have a life of their own and one is not in control of what happens to them. But inevitably, they are my babies and I want them to be shown in the right way.”

The judge, Justice Teare, commented: “It is not possible for me to describe it. One expert described it as sensuous and sexy, the other as clumsy and somewhat absurd.”

During a clearout at the storage firm, an employee had the sculpture junked, though its bright red acrylic and pigment should have warned him that he was dealing with a work of art.

The sculpture had been bought as a wedding anniversary gift by Ofir Scheps, a Geneva-based art collector. It was due to be auctioned at Christie’s but Scheps picked it up from the owner in June 2004 for about £20,000.

Scheps then arranged for the sculpture to be moved into storage in south-west London by Fine Arts Logistics pending its removal to Kapoor’s studio for restoration.

But when the time came for the work to be transferred, in September 2004, it could not be found. The judge remarked: “It is the considered opinion of the general manager of Fine Arts Logistics that Hole and Vessel II was placed in a skip and destroyed at a waste transfer station.”

Referring to the 1m by 1.6m by 1m sculpture, Nicholas Logsdail, Kapoor’s dealer, said: “In all my experience, I’ve never seen something of that size vanish.”

The company claimed that its liability was limited to only £587 under its standard terms and conditions, while Scheps sued for £600,000, which he claimed was the current value following a rise in the price of Kapoor’s works.

Some of Kapoor’s work is reported to have changed hands privately for as much as £11 million.

Jonathan Hood, executive vice-chairman of Fine Art Logistics, admitted the piece disappeared during construction work at the warehouse.

“The only unusual factor was that during the period in which it occurred, we were having extensive construction work carried out at our next-door storage facility, ironically to further upgrade its security,” he said.

The judge ruled compensation should be £351,375, made up of the sculpture’s £132,000 value at the time of loss and £219,375 for the amount it would have increased since that time.