WANGECHI MUTU NAMED 2010 DEUTSCHE BANK ARTIST OF THE YEAR
Wangechi Mutu, a Nairobi-born artist who now lives in New York, has been named the 2010 Deutsche Bank Artist of the Year, reports the Wall Street Journal. Instead of a grant, the bank said today it plans to underwrite a solo show of Mutu’s latest work at the Deutsche Guggenheim in Berlin. The exhibit will open April 30.
Mutu is known for exploring society’s stereotypes of female beauty and exoticism by creating writhing portraits of women whose eyes and lips have often been cut from fashion magazines. She was chosen for the award by curators including Okwui Enwezor, Nancy Spector, and Hou Hanru, according to Friedhelm Hütte, the bank’s global head of art.
In a telephone interview, Mutu said she plans to create an “intimate, warm space” within the museum by covering its walls and windows with coarse gray blankets—the kind typically used by Kenya’s working poor or by moving companies in the West as packing material. One blanketed wall will double as a screen for her new video, Mud, which she said depicts a naked woman standing in a small, dungeonlike space, wailing as she is pelted by mud falling overhead.
