El Anatsui is one of the most respected contemporary artists working today, whose work has been collected and exhibited around the globe. The Des Moines Art Center was proud to host a career retrospective of his art in 2013, during which he visited our city and gave a public lecture. During my conversations with him, he was excited at the prospect of his beautiful, brightly-colored sculptures being viewed against the backdrop of snow coming through the museum windows – a sight not common in Nigeria where he lives and works. Anatsui began his career studying art in his native Ghana, eventually becoming a teacher there. In 1975, he was offered a position in the large city of Nsukka, Nigeria, and it is in that country that his career began to flourish. His first works that gained attention were small wooden sculptures inspired by both abstract art and traditional West African carving and textiles (one of which is the University of Iowa’s Stanley Museum of Art). One day in 1999, he discovered a discarded bag of aluminum bottle tops, and took them back to his studio. The liquor distilleries of Nigeria recycle the glass bottles they produce but throw away their metal tops as they are marked with logos of various competing brands. These tops soon became the basis for the revolutionary hanging artworks that would bring Anatsui international fame, of which Basin is an example. When cut and bent, the flexibility of these small metal pieces, combined with their vivid colors, allows “if you touch something, you leave a charge on it, and anybody else touching it connects with you, in a way.” - El Anatsui
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