The artistry of tapestry creation extends beyond conventional threads and yarns. There are indeed artists who explore the possibilities of skillfully weaving disparate materials with remarkable results.
Using a technique similar to that developed by Paco Rabanne in his pioneering chain mail dresses, El Anatsui incorporates in his works found materials such as discarded aluminum caps and plastic seals from liquor bottles. The outcome is nothing short of mesmerizing, particularly when these monumental works create intricate formations and graceful folds, captivating the beholder with their sheer magnificence.
Based in Accra, Ghana, Serge Attukwei Clottey creates instead monumental pieces with yellow "Kufuor" containers. Their name derives from John Kofi Agyekum Kufuor, a Ghanaian politician who served as the President of Ghana from 2001 to 2009, and was also chairperson of the African Union from 2007 to 2008.
Clottey works across installation, performance, photography, painting and sculpture, exploring personal and political narratives rooted in histories of trade and migration.
The artist is the founder of the GoLokal collective and the creator of "Afrogallonism", an artistic concept commenting on consumption within modern Africa through the utilisation of the ubiquitous yellow gallon containers found throughout Ghana, but arriving from Europe as cooking oil canisters and reused to store or carry water and petrol.
By cutting them into irregular squares and linking the squares one to the other with metal rings, Clottey builds striking tapestries. His latest installation - entitled "Time and Chance" and developed for the 18th International Architecture Exhibition in Venice (until 26th November 2023) - is currently on display outside the Arsenale, under one of the Gaggiandre.
The work hangs organically, its shape defined by its own weight, suspended gracefully above the water, casting shimmering reflections along the surface below. Inside the Corderie there is instead a large fragment of the same work found at the Gaggiandre.
Clottey skillfully engages with global material culture by employing the yellow containers, transforming them through cutting, drilling, stitching, and melting. The gallons utilized in Clottey's artworks are not inherently African, as they are products of plastic construction, they are imported and subsequently discarded. But, by using them for his pieces, Clottey seamlessly reintegrates these materials in the African culture, imbuing them with renewed value and significance through his artistic process.
In his installations at the Venice Biennale, his plastic tapestries embrace the inherent character of Venetian architecture: the large site-specific installation at the Gaggiandre delves into the interplay between "Afrogallonism" and this culturally significant location. Architecture becomes indeed more than a backdrop, it turns into an integral part of the narrative.
In Venice Clottey's works find unlikely correspondences in locally made textiles and fabrics, from precious velvets to the thinnest finely pleated Fortuny gowns, but also in the Byzantine style mosaics that can be admired at Saint Mark's Basilica, with their bright golden background.
These juxtapositions engender a fascinating interplay of contrasts between luxurious, thin and ethereal textiles and textures, precious mosaics and modern materials (it is also interesting to note how some of Clottey's tapestries seen from a distance call to mind Gustav Klimt's Golden Phase artworks, that were in turn inspired by the Byzantine mosaics in Ravenna and Venice...).
Last but not least, these contrasts do not only generate a visually compelling architectural narrative, but they also urge us to confront the profound impact of waste and the extensive reach of global consumption.
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