Into Orbit: the mother of all helter-skelters

When it was revealed that the ArcelorMittal Orbit – Anish Kapoor's controversial installation at London's Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park – was to be turned into a slide, the question on everyone's lips was why it had taken so long. The revenue-raising idea was the brainchild of former Mayor Boris Johnson, and the helter skelter-esque sculpture can now lay claim to being the longest and tallest tunnel slide in the world.

Thrill-seekers can enjoy 15mph speeds as they navigate the 12 curves, including one section so tight, it's been nicknamed the bettfeder – German for 'bed spring'. Adrenaline surge aside, the new incarnation also represents a meeting of creative minds. Conceived by scientist-cum-artist Carsten Höller, it's in the same vein as his other high-profile projects in the capital that have breached the boundary between playground fun and contemporary art, such as the pair of slides on the Hayward Gallery's roof last year as part of the Southbank Centre's Carsten Höller: Decision exhibition.

'I've built a number of slides, since 1999, both free-standing and attached to buildings, but never onto another artwork, as in this case,' says Höller. 'Now the two works will be intertwined, I see it as one of these doubling situations that I'm so interested in. I like it when a sense of unity is reached in two separate entities.'

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The Belgian maintains that 'it's impossible to travel down a slide without smiling', and is fascinated with the slide's effect on the psyche. His 2006 exhibition Test Site at Tate Modern featured no fewer than five, leading from different gallery levels to a shared landing point in the Turbine Hall, with visitors encouraged to test how their experience might vary across them all.

'A slide is a sculpture you can travel inside. However, it would be a mistake to think you have to use the slide to make sense of it; looking at it from the outside is a different but equally valid experience,' he says. 'A slide is also a device for experiencing a unique emotional state somewhere between delight and madness. It was described in the 1950s by the French polymath Roger Caillois as "a kind of voluptuous panic upon an otherwise lucid mind".'

Höller has even talked about slides in the context of urban planning, going as far as to commission a study exploring how London might benefit from this innovative form of transportation. While the idea may seem far-fetched, a private commission has already seen him create a three-storey slide for Miuccia Prada – it takes her straight from her Milan office to the street outside, where her driver awaits to take her home. Whether this type of ride could become an everyday experience for the masses, however, remains a way off yet.

arcelormittalorbit.com; slide rides from £7