Magnificent six

Anyone who goes into the Annely Juda Gallery in Dering Street expecting something like those light, airy, weight-denying abstract steel sculptures, painted bright red all over perhaps, like the Tate’s song-evoking ‘Early One Morning’, 1962, is in for a big surprise. All works shown here stand with absolute, resolute, broad-based firmness as if to proclaim that they are what they are. ‘Jupiter’, for example, made in 2005, boasts some nine points of contact with the floor. Caro famously shed the need for a pedestal over 40 years ago and this decision continues to add a certain strength of identity to his sculptures. Self-contained strength is what most of his recent works assert. There is often a delightful individuality but there are sombre elements as well. All but one of the works shown are made of steel galvanised in zinc and this, too, is a departure. Light reflects off these silvery surfaces in a special, variable way.

An element of surprise is always stimulating when new work is shown but given that its aim is to produce some sort of life-enhancing experience, the crucial test of an art exhibition is the extent to which its total effect adds up to more than the sum of its parts. There are only six Anthony Caro sculptures here but they are mainly large or extremely large. All were made during the past four years. From the very first glance, the mutually beneficial interaction between one sculpture and another, the buzz, if you like, produced by contrasts, similarities and different viewing angles, ensures that this show passes the above-mentioned test with ease, especially as the works are well sited in relation to the gallery space. Any blood, sweat, toil and tears that went into the conceiving, making and installing is now invisible — and that is how it should be.