Wangechi Mutu Quotes

I've always loved the idea that you think you know what you're looking at from a distance, yet when you come up close, it gets intricate and nutty and obscene and provocative.

- Wangechi Mutu

We became Homo sapiens not that long ago, from the scientific perspective, and we've retained a lot of our beast nature. We've done all these amazing things in terms of our knowledge base and technology, and now we're flying around and using the Internet. But we're still very animalistic.

- Wangechi Mutu

I have this amateur side attraction to, and interest in, the sciences and biology and physics and evolution. Paleontology is of interest to me. I'm interested in the way these fields have helped us understand how we are human and why we are human.

- Wangechi Mutu

While I was a student at The Cooper Union, they discouraged too much of a focus on any one medium, and it helped me try new and different things.

- Wangechi Mutu

My work is often a therapy for myself - a working out of these issues as a black woman. And a way of allowing other black women to work through this kind of stigmatization as they look through the images and feel how distorted or contorted they might be in the public eye.

- Wangechi Mutu

In 'National Geographic,' you always saw pictures of tribal Africa. And here I am, sitting in Nairobi in our suburban house, watching TV and thinking, 'Why is it always going to be these tribal people 'that are the ambassadors of our image?

- Wangechi Mutu

I watched a lot of avant-garde films, like Maya Deren's work, and I love film's technical ability to do things that are impossible in real life. It's related to the way collage allows you to manipulate reality and the hierarchies that are inherent in our awful but amazing world.

- Wangechi Mutu

For me, collages manage to - it satisfies all of my madness, like I'm able to make these obsessive things, but then I'm also able to make these very strong statements. I don't know what they mean to other people, but in my mind, they have a very strong particular resonance; there's sort of a power.

- Wangechi Mutu

Often, there's an emphasis in my work, and it's sort of the celebrating of the body.

- Wangechi Mutu

Gold and precious gems are, in many places, the one form of wealth a woman can use to protect and enhance herself within the elaborate structure of patriarchy.

- Wangechi Mutu

I believe art is a connection, like passing on a flame.

- Wangechi Mutu

So many a time, I would find myself stuck in my studio while, in another country, my exhibitions were opening and I was being celebrated.

- Wangechi Mutu

There are ways to speak that can transform things, which has less to do with authority but is more about resourcefulness and ingenuity.

- Wangechi Mutu

Being taught to despise your body is being taught to perhaps admire someone else's body more than yours - being taught that your body is good for certain things and not for others.

- Wangechi Mutu

I am inspired and affected by Aspen, the light and the landscape and the natural world.

- Wangechi Mutu

The ocean is the source of life. We all come from there. I think about these one-celled creatures, and I think about the planet. It is related to my obsession with biology, even if it's only a layperson's obsession. The way I visualise what's at the bottom of the ocean is very much to do with how I feel when I'm swimming in the sea.

- Wangechi Mutu

Beautiful things can happen when you act intuitively and instinctively in a moment of anxiety and do something radical.

- Wangechi Mutu

Our interest is in showing that homophobia is not part of the agenda for a new Africa.

- Wangechi Mutu

I juxtapose and slice up reality and fiction quite easily. I'm aware that it is up for grabs and a powerful tool to explain how we take control.

- Wangechi Mutu

I use femaleness as another lens, so I don't even think all my creatures are women; I just think that I bring out the femaleness in them.

- Wangechi Mutu

My works tends to be erotic.

- Wangechi Mutu

If something hurtful enters your body, you create something beautiful to protect yourself from it. That's my philosophy.

- Wangechi Mutu

'Misguided Little Unforgivable Hierarchies' is a piece that I did around the time that I was very frustrated and angry with the fact that the U.S., where I live, had decided to pull itself into another war. I was really angry.

- Wangechi Mutu

If I don't have an ability to go the places that I have been invited to show at and to speak at and to feature my talent, well then, I am going to stay here in New York City and work my butt off.

- Wangechi Mutu

I would like to make work for my country, art which is innately Kenyan by being made in Kenya.

- Wangechi Mutu

One of the things I'm interested in is not just women but the female qualities that are present in everyone.

- Wangechi Mutu

Born Free is an idea that came from a place of deep respect for the delicate cycle of life. How incredible to be able to work with gifted designers who, as mothers, recognize what the devastating loss of a child could mean and how easily that loss can be avoided.

- Wangechi Mutu

The medium of film is really wonderful because it can behave in the same way as collage and painting; it can be layered and non-literal.

- Wangechi Mutu

Equal rights for women and queer folks!

- Wangechi Mutu

I am fascinated by these ocean-grown folks. On the coast, there's all this cross-pollination of ideas. Someone thinks they saw something. One person's madness is reiterated by another, and a story is born. The rumour becomes a substitute for news.

- Wangechi Mutu

I'm big into multifunctional clothing.

- Wangechi Mutu

When certain things reach a tipping point, and you know people's lives are in danger, you have to decide that it's time to speak up, and you have to say something loud and clear.

- Wangechi Mutu

I think there is something about countries and nations that is hard to define. And, in fact, that's probably why we create such massive boundaries - because it's so slippery where they begin and where they end.

- Wangechi Mutu

There's a recycling mentality about my work.

- Wangechi Mutu

I feel like I've spent a lot of time imagining home and thinking about a dream-like place, as opposed to a real place, because that's not what I was able to do, meaning go home or be home.

- Wangechi Mutu

I'm very much a person that believes that there's something that was introduced into Kenya and Africa as we know it that has made us despise our bodies.

- Wangechi Mutu

Football has that wonderful gift of being accessible. You don't need much gear, a coach, or a lifeguard. You just need your imagination, strong legs, and a couple of friends, and it's a game.

- Wangechi Mutu

Motherhood is the ultimate call to sacrifice.

- Wangechi Mutu

I keep things moving along with a seriously loving, caring, and brilliant man, a fierce group of friends - and really strong coffee.

- Wangechi Mutu

We have to redefine what we mean when we say, 'Who are your people?' 'Where are you from?'

- Wangechi Mutu

I love magazines because they're so dispensable, and they're so quickly consumed. In that way, they're quite honest. They're unashamed about how small an amount of time they're trying to keep our attention.

- Wangechi Mutu

I've always been curious about the things that I'm afraid to look at, that make me embarrassed or bother me.

- Wangechi Mutu

Some people get turned on by my work, and it sells, but what drives me is the process of making it.

- Wangechi Mutu

When I'm making a collage, there are a lot of things about it that are violent.

- Wangechi Mutu

I do all I can to make my world a better place to live in for me and for my kids as well.

- Wangechi Mutu

I really believe in dreaming and making things from nothing.

- Wangechi Mutu