El Anatsui
El Anatsui (born 1944) weaves colorful metal tapestries from reclaimed bottle caps and bits of wire, reminiscent of Kente cloth, a banded traditional fiber made predominantly by the West African Akan people of the Ashante Kingdom. While born and raised in Ghana, El Anatsui has spent most of his artistic career in Nsukka, Nigeria where he has reinterpreted the important history of textiles of West African culture. These metal tapestries are woven from metal liquor bottles, referencing the tradition of venerating and honoring ancestors of with a libation of alcohol. The use of found materials also reflects his beliefs in repurposing and transformation, helping him and the viewer transcend the limitations of place while simultaneously referencing colonialism, consumption and waste.
El Anatsui received his Bachelor of Arts and postgraduate diploma in Art Education at the College of Art, University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, Ghana. He has received the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the Venice Biennale and is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Centre Pompidou, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the British Museum.
RELATED WORKS
- Contemporary Kenyan-American artist Wangechi Mutu reflects on themes of cultural trauma and environmental destruction in her work. View her work.
- In the collection of our sister gallery, form & concept, contemporary sculptor and jeweler MJ Tyson repurposes castoff metals in innovative ways. View her work.
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TEXTURES
A Textile-inspired Print Show 25 Jun - 2 Oct 2021Textiles are as complex as they are quotidian. We interface with fiber constantly (it’s enveloping you right now) but seldom investigate our longstanding bond with material. Within their threaded DNA,...Read more -
Chromo
Annual Winter/Spring Print Show 31 Jan - 4 Jul 2020El Anatsui, Mel Bochner, Helen Frankenthaler, Sam Gilliam, Sol LeWitt, Mark Mulroney, Bruce Nauman, Louise Nevelson, Mimmo Paladino, Hayal Pozanti, Robert Rauschenberg, Bridget Riley, Ed Ruscha, Jonas Wood at Zane Bennett Contemporary ArtRead more -
Folio
29 Nov 2019 - 14 Feb 2020Zane Bennett Contemporary announces its annual group exhibition , which features Zane Bennett Gallery staff favorites from the 2019 collection, including Judy Chicago's Birth Tear/Tear and Ghada Amer and Reza...Read more -
El Anatsui: Recent Works
26 Apr - 13 Sep 2019“If you touch something, you leave a charge on it,” says El Anatsui. “And anybody else touching it connects with you, in a way.” Woven with recycled aluminum and copper...Read more
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El Anatsui Wins Skowhegan Medal for Sculpture
September 20, 2020El Anatusi, a Nigerian artist born in Ghana is known for his large-scale metal woven tapestries hung in galleries and museums around the world. He...Read more -
El Anatsui at Haus der Kunst
Prinzregentenstraße 1, Munich March 8, 2019With El Anatsui: Triumphant Scale, Haus der Kunst shows the most comprehensive and detailed presentation of El Anatsui's oeuvre thus far. Occupying the entire East...Read more
