Yinka Shonibare CBE RA: 'Wind Sculpture in Bronze I'

‘Wind Sculpture in Bronze I’ by Yinka Shonibare CBE RA is the third permanent sculpture presented to Royal Djurgården by Princess Estelle, Duchess of Östergötland's cultural foundation. The two metre sculpture, rendered in steel and fibreglass, captures the shifting movement of wind passing through Shonibare's signature Dutch wax batik fabric on a dramatic scale.

”Made in factories in Holland using Indonesian batik as a model, the fabric was sold in Britain’s West African colonies where it became so popular that it came to be seen in the eyes of the world as an authentically African product: it is a perfect starting point for conversations about our multifaceted identities and global interdependencies.” – Yinka Shonibare CBE RA

The work installed in Princess Estelle’s Sculpture Park can be seen as a stand-alone continuation of a journey that began in 2004, when Shonibare worked in Stockholm for a period. During his stay, he created a work for Moderna Museet in the form of a giant ship in a bottle, based on the Vasa, a government ship. On the same theme, in 2010 Shonibare made a replica of another ship, ‘Nelson’s Ship in a Bottle’, which was displayed on the fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square. In both works, the white sails were replaced by Dutch wax batik cloths, and it is the same variegated sailcloths that inspired the new sculpture at the Royal Djurgården.