"[My chosen media] are sourced from my immediate environment; they have been put to intense human use. They are thought to have lost value. They are ignored, discarded or thrown away ... To me, their provenance imbues or charges them with history and content, which I seek to explore in order to highlight certain conditions of mankind's existence, as well as his relationship with himself and the environment. I therefore try to bring these objects back, to present them again in ways which seem to make them confront their former lives and the lives of those who have used them."
One of El Anatsui’s most unique ‘cloths’, this triumphant work is emblematic of his bottle cap practice. The artist often worked in pairs during this particular period, and Vumedi bears a striking resemblance to Fading Cloth, which was also made in 2005. Fading Cloth, another major work by El Anatsui, is currently held in the collection of the Saint Louis Art Museum, and is thought to be the sister piece to the present lot.
From a distance, Vumedi reads as one elegant piece of undulating, glittering cloth. However, upon closer inspection, one notices the careful and subtle weaving of hundreds of metal bottle caps of various brilliant shades of red, black, yellow and gold. Together, these pounded out metallic sheets present an enchanting abstract wall hanging by one of the most sought-after contemporary artists of our time.
El Anatsui’s use of bottle tops began in 1998 when, while taking an exploratory walk, the artist stumbled upon a bag of discarded bottle caps. El Anatsui left the bottle tops in his studio for several months before the idea came to him ‘that by stitching them together [he] could get them to articulate some statement. When the process of stitching got underway, [he] discovered that the result resembled a real fabric cloth.’ (Susan Vogel, El Anatsui Art and Life, p. 54). Inspired by the sculptural forms of the undulating ‘fabric’, the artist’s chance encounter with these bottle tops would profoundly influence his practice and ultimately give life to his distinguishable installations.
''Several things went through my mind when I found the bag of bottle tops in the bush,’ he says. ‘I thought of the objects as links between my continent, Africa, and the rest of Europe. Objects such as these were introduced to Africa by Europeans when they came as traders... I thought that the bottle caps had a strong reference to the history of Africa’'
This opulent work exhibits as much intricacy in its conceptual anchoring as it does in its production. Born in Ghana in 1944, El Anatsui came of age amongst a generation grappling with the development of post-colonial life on the continent, and the globalization of Africa. To the artist, these bottle caps, usually from liquor bottles, hold significant historical and political value. Through their use, the artist breathes new life into these relics of a time past, referencing the connectivity between Africa and the Western world and the region’s complex colonial history.
Anatsui’s cloths are also reminiscent of the traditional kente cloth from Ghana, a ceremonial cloth usually worn by kings, traditionally adorned with West African Adinkra symbols. The artist became familiar with this cloth early in life thanks to his father’s position as a master weaver. The red, yellow, and black colours seen in the present lot are commonly used and are symbolic of Ghana’s flag. With its connection to the Western slave trade, the artist’s refence to Kente cloth is a further nod to the continent’s past.
With an ever-growing repertoire of blockbuster exhibition under his belt, El Anatsui continues to solidify his position as one of the most important contemporary artists working today. His most recent solo exhibition, Triumphant Scale, held in 2019 at Munich’s Haus der Kunst, was one of the most comprehensive exhibitions of the artist’s work to date and was curated by the late Okwui Enwezor, a trailblazing curator and former Director of the Haus der Kunst and Curator of the 2015 Venice Biennale. Other solo exhibitions include When I Last Wrote to you About Africa in 2010 and a show in 2008 at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art in Washington D.C. In 2014, El Anatsui became an honorary Royal Academician and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the oldest scholarly societies in the United States. El Anatsui has received several prestigious awards such as the 2015 Venice Biennale Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement, the 2009 Smithsonian National Museum of African Art 30th Anniversary Award and the 2017 Praenium Imperiale Award for Sculpture.
Bibliography:
Susan Mullin Vogel, El Anatsui: Art and Life, 2012, p. 53-43 & p. 104