White Cube is pleased to announce two concurrent exhibitions in Asia by renowned sculptor El Anatsui (b. 1944, Anyako, Ghana), his first with the gallery. Following the artist’s major presentation ‘After the Red Moon’ at the Museum of Art Pudong in Shanghai (2024) – adapted from his acclaimed installation ‘Behind the Red Moon’ for Tate Modern’s Hyundai Commission in 2023–24 – this new and unprecedented body of work will be unveiled across White Cube’s galleries in Hong Kong and Seoul, as well as at Art Basel Hong Kong.
Working in metal, ceramic and wood, alongside continuous experiments in printmaking, Anatsui is celebrated for a highly inventive sculptural practice predicated upon sustained investigations into the layered cultural narratives, material transformation and global circulation of everyday objects.
White Cube debuts a series of new sculptures that expand upon Anatsui’s unique repertoire of works made exclusively from salvaged bottle caps. Having introduced this quotidian material nearly three decades ago, he continues to explore its seemingly limitless aesthetic potential. Produced in his studio in Accra, they comprise thousands of coloured metal bottle caps, intricately worked, then sutured together into complex and richly textured compositions.
In this new series, for the first time, Anatsui places equal emphasis on the recto and verso of the sculpture, allowing the works to be installed either on or away from the wall and viewed from both sides. With an elegantly restrained palette, the works on view mark the artist’s latest formulation of his own key invention – the ‘non-fixed form’.
At the 2026 edition of Art Basel Hong Kong (27–29 March 2026), White Cube will present a key work from this series as a booth highlight. Hovering in space, one side of the work is composed in varying shades of deep, earthy reds – all tones innate to the original mass-produced material – while its reverse reveals a shimmering field of silver. Anatsui’s work was first shown in Asia in 1995 at the Osaka Triennale, followed by his museum-touring exhibition in Japan, ‘A Fateful Journey: Africa in the Works of El Anatsui’ (2010–2011), and most recently the Museum of Art Pudong in Shanghai (2024). In 2017, Anatsui received the prestigious Praemium Imperiale Award for Sculpture from the Japan Art Association. Major survey exhibitions by the artist include ‘Triumphant Scale' at Haus der Kunst, Munich, Germany, travelling to Mathaf, Doha, and Kunstmuseum Bern, Switzerland (2019–20); ‘Gravity and Grace’ at Akron Art Museum, Ohio, travelling to US institutions including Brooklyn Museum, New York, and Bass Museum, Miami, Florida (2012–14), as well as the Venice Biennale, Italy (2007, 2015, and the inaugural Ghana Pavilion in 2019). In 2015, he was awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the Venice Biennale, and in 2023 he was named in the Time 100 list. His ‘Safety Curtain’ commission for Museum in Progress at the Vienna State Opera is currently on view until June 2026.
Anatsui’s works are held in leading international collections including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC; Setagaya Museum, Tokyo; 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, Japan; Guggenheim Museums Bilbao and Abu Dhabi; British Museum, London; Tate, London; Centre Pompidou, Paris; and the Vatican Museums, Rome.
