WANGECHI MUTU (1973 - )
Three from the Bottle People Series.

Three mixed media and glass sculptures, 1997. Approximately 318x70 mm, 279x64 mm and 248x64 mm; 12½x2¾ inches, 11x2½ inches and 9¾x2½ inches.

Provenance: acquired directly from the artist, private collection.

Exhibited: (similar examples) Laurie Ann Farrell. Looking Both Ways: Art of the Contemporary African Diaspora, p. 143; fig 84a-c; Margo Norton and Vivian Crockett, Wangechi Mutu: Intertwined, pp. 20-23.

This striking group of sculpture are scarce, early assemblages made by the artist - Wangechi Mutu began this series while completing her BFA at the Cooper Union in 1997. Mutu's Bottle People Series were first exhibited in a 2003-04 traveling exhibition organized by the Museum of African Art, New York. A larger group from the artist's collection were featured as her earliest works in her 2023 retrospective Wangechi Mutu: Intertwined at the New Museum, New York.