FB

The Florence Biennale conferred to El Anatsui the “Lorenzo il Magnifico” Lifetime Achievement Award "for masterfully interweaving memories and meanings in his representation of the essence of Africa, inspiring a global audience through the rediscovery of the inextricable relationship between Man and Nature. His art is expressed in countless works of great visual impact made by creatively experimenting with recycled materials such as metals and wood, with which he has shown the world that 'the poverty of the materials used in art does not in any way preclude the telling of wonderful stories of great richness’”.

Born in 1944 in Anyanko, in the Volta region of Ghana, El Anatsui lived in a mission house up to high school. From 1965 to 1969 he attended the College of Art in what is now called the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology di Kumase. Since 1975 he has taught at the University of Nigeria-Nsukka (UNN) in the Enugu province, where he also holds the position of Head of the Sculpture Department. He still lives and works in Nsukka, yet maintaining close connections with his native Ghana – whose culture, along with the heritage from various areas of Africa and also Western suggestions, has provided fertile ground for El Anatsui’s art. He emerged as an artist from the 1960s post-colonial art movements and 1970s west Africa, and debuted with his first solo show in Nigeria in 1976. In 1980, the Artist residency he won at the Cummington Community of the Arts in Massachusetts heightened his sensitivity, and led him to step into an international scene.