People & Places: Meet Essilfie Banton, the Ghanaian turning trash into expensive art worth millions

He owns the Trash to Art company and so far, is the only known artist exploring the kind of art he does.

Like the name suggests, Essilfie goes around, picking up waste or trash from the environment, washes them and stores them for art projects.

After this, he conceptualises an idea and uses these collected waste items, mostly plastic waste, to form concrete images and portraits of people.

He has been doing this since 2019 and is now an expert.

Through his work, he has produced works of the first President of Ghana, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, late former President Jerry John Rawlings, Musician Wiyaala and President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.

Speaking to People & Places' Wonder Ami Hagan when the team visited Essilfie to learn all about what he does, he told the story of how he got where he is now.

Whilst discovering his love for art, he decided to tow a line that no other Ghanaian artist known has yet dared to - converting trash to art.

Today, his works are worth millions of dollars and cedis.

CEO of Trash to Art – Essilfie Banton who also doubles as a teacher at the Mpraeso Senior High School, tells his story here in this edition of People and Places:

Watch the full interview below: