Anderson Mukomberanwa was born in Harare in 1968 and is the son of eminent First Generation Sculptor, Nicholas Mukomberanwa. Whilst this fact has endowed him with natural ability and interest, it has also driven him to break away and energetically search out his own identity and direction.
From the beginning Anderson worked with hard challenging stones unlike many young sculptors who began with softer steatites. This has ensured a degree of skill that now enables him to turn a wide range of ideas and tackle many of his ambitions.
Andersons work portrays, with humour and compassion, the world immediately around him. This often light-hearted approach to serious elements of contemporary Zimbabwean society belies an artist with grave views on the direction of sculpture in his country. Fuelled as he is by his need to be different, he urges his contemporaries to make the same bid for individuality.
Sadly Anderson died from cancer early 2003. As a personal friend of mine, I miss him greatly, for his great character, sense of humour and contagious laugh. He was passionate about his work, always experimenting with different styles.
He later became fascinated with his etching and print-work arising firstly from stone, to hand-made paper, then more recently onto wood plates. Anderson was always a painter in his spare time too and hisstudio was always full of sketches and canvases, depicting the same styles he carried across from stone, often using bright vivid colours.
He leaves behind his wife Nyarai and two children.