8.23.2011

Artist to Know - El Anatsui

Today's artist to know elevates recycling to an art form.


El Anatsui

El Anatsui is a West African artist who taught at the Nigerian university for three decades, and is known simply as “Prof”. Today he create amazing wall sculptures with discarded liquor bottle tops.


Before he started working with the bottle caps about 10 years ago, Anatsui was a well known wood sculpting artist. He started working with the bottle caps after finding a bag of them on the side of the road.


Anatsui began experimenting with the bottle tops by cutting and folding their pliable metal into flat swatches, and then stitching these together with copper wire. The result resemble fabric metal cloth.


Anatsui insists that his hangings be draped rather than hung flat, but he doesn’t need to drape them himself, in fact is perfectly happy to have galleries or museums do so.


His work has been shown in Australia, London, Venice, and New York, and  even thou he does not consider himself an international artist he is know as one all over the world.
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6 comments:

  1. Wow! I would not have guessed these were bottle caps! Amazing work. ~Val

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  2. I recently saw a piece of his at the Metropolitan Museum in New York. It was the largest work I have ever seen.

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  3. What a creative idea - metal cloth! :D That's so neat!

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