The Times of London pegs Anish Kapoor’s fortune at £40m. That’s not quite Hirst’s £235m or Lucien Freud’s £120m, but still a healthy achievement:
According to the Companies House filing, the main activity of Kapoor’s company, White Dark, is “the creation and sale of fine art”. Its 2008 accounts show an operating profit of £17.2m, up from £8.4m the previous year.
Kapoor has invested heavily in property since he bought a studio in Camberwell, southeast London, for £250,000 in 2001. His £2.7m newly built home in Chelsea has walls of glass, stone and shimmering stainless steel. Last year, he added a £4m townhouse in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, central London, to his portfolio. He also owns a £2m property in the Bahamas. Kapoor has now set his sights on a country retreat and is understood to be in the market for Ashdown House, a 17th-century National Trust property in the Berkshire downs. A 41-year lease for the eight-bedroom mansion is being marketed for £4.5m, while an 83-year lease costs £5.3m.
Sculptor with Big Ideas, Anish Kapoor, Joins the High Rollers (Times of London)