Preamble
For your convenience I have listed below other posts in this series:
Diversity of African Textiles
African Textiles: West Africa
Stripweaves (West Africa) - Part I
Stripweaves (West Africa) - Part II
Stripweaves (West Africa) - Part III
Stripweaves (West Africa) - Part IV
Djerma Weaving of Niger and Burkina-Faso
Woolen Stripweaves of the Niger Bend
Nigerian Horizontal - Loom Weaving
Yoruba Lace Weave
Nigerian Women's Vertical Looms
The Supplementary Weft Cloths of Ijebu-Ode and Akwete
African Tie and Dye
Tie and Dye of the Dida, Ivory Coast
African Stitch Resist
Yoruba Stitch Resist
Yoruba: Machine-Stitched Resist Indigo-Dyed Cloth
Yoruba and Baulé Warp Ikat
Adinkra Stamped Cloths of Ghana [1]
In Ghana, as in many parts of Africa, funerals have great symbolic value and mourners dress in dark, sombre colors. In the village of Ntonso, close to Bonwire (the center of Ashanti weaving) and the great market town of Kumasi, specially commissioned robes of adinkra hand-printed cloth that are traditionally associated with mourning are made. Elderly men print motifs such as the fern or the moon, each of which has a proverbial meaning, on to Chinese mill cloth with stamps carved out of a calabash gourd. Adinkra cloths made for funerals and mourning are overdyed red or black, but others retain their white background and are worn at festive occasions. Those who cannot afford a new adinkra cloth will dye an old, brightly colored kente cloth a sombre hue in an infusion of the bark of the badee tree.
Young Fante women from the Gold Coast wearing country-made cloths. The woman sitting in the middle at the front is dressed in an adinkra calabash printed cloth.
Stamps carved from from calabash shells for printing adinkra cloth.
More stamps carved from from calabash shells for printing adinkra cloth.
The design motifs for adinkra are carved into the hard outer surface of sections of calabash. The handle is made by pressing four raphia-palm splints into its soft inner skin and drawing their ends together with a cloth rag. The printer draws out a grid on the 2.7 x 3.6 meters (3 x 4 yards) mill cloth with a bamboo splint dipped into a thick dark goo that is obtained by boiling down badee tree root bark mixed with iron slag. He then applies rows of a different set of design motifs to each square of the grid by repeatedly rolling one of the slightly curved stamps within the area. Sometimes he may decorate alternate squares with parallel lines by drawing a small bamboo comb across them. In one day each worker can complete about two cloths, which are then hung out overnight to catch the dew. Nowadays the rows of printed squares on adinkra cloths are divided by longitudinal lines using a type of faggoting stitch in red, black, yellow and green.
Detail of an adinkra cloth made at the village of Ntonso, Ghana, printed with calabash stamps with the moon motif.
Early 20th-century Ashanti adinkra cloth with allegorical motifs printed within a black, stripwoven grid.
Adinkra cloth from Ghana. The cloth has been divided into squares, each of which has been filled with prints of one allegorcal motif.
Reference:
[1] J. Gillow, African Textiles, Thames & Hudson Ltd, London (2003).
For your convenience I have listed below other posts in this series:
Diversity of African Textiles
African Textiles: West Africa
Stripweaves (West Africa) - Part I
Stripweaves (West Africa) - Part II
Stripweaves (West Africa) - Part III
Stripweaves (West Africa) - Part IV
Djerma Weaving of Niger and Burkina-Faso
Woolen Stripweaves of the Niger Bend
Nigerian Horizontal - Loom Weaving
Yoruba Lace Weave
Nigerian Women's Vertical Looms
The Supplementary Weft Cloths of Ijebu-Ode and Akwete
African Tie and Dye
Tie and Dye of the Dida, Ivory Coast
African Stitch Resist
Yoruba Stitch Resist
Yoruba: Machine-Stitched Resist Indigo-Dyed Cloth
Yoruba and Baulé Warp Ikat
Adinkra Stamped Cloths of Ghana [1]
In Ghana, as in many parts of Africa, funerals have great symbolic value and mourners dress in dark, sombre colors. In the village of Ntonso, close to Bonwire (the center of Ashanti weaving) and the great market town of Kumasi, specially commissioned robes of adinkra hand-printed cloth that are traditionally associated with mourning are made. Elderly men print motifs such as the fern or the moon, each of which has a proverbial meaning, on to Chinese mill cloth with stamps carved out of a calabash gourd. Adinkra cloths made for funerals and mourning are overdyed red or black, but others retain their white background and are worn at festive occasions. Those who cannot afford a new adinkra cloth will dye an old, brightly colored kente cloth a sombre hue in an infusion of the bark of the badee tree.
The design motifs for adinkra are carved into the hard outer surface of sections of calabash. The handle is made by pressing four raphia-palm splints into its soft inner skin and drawing their ends together with a cloth rag. The printer draws out a grid on the 2.7 x 3.6 meters (3 x 4 yards) mill cloth with a bamboo splint dipped into a thick dark goo that is obtained by boiling down badee tree root bark mixed with iron slag. He then applies rows of a different set of design motifs to each square of the grid by repeatedly rolling one of the slightly curved stamps within the area. Sometimes he may decorate alternate squares with parallel lines by drawing a small bamboo comb across them. In one day each worker can complete about two cloths, which are then hung out overnight to catch the dew. Nowadays the rows of printed squares on adinkra cloths are divided by longitudinal lines using a type of faggoting stitch in red, black, yellow and green.
Reference:
[1] J. Gillow, African Textiles, Thames & Hudson Ltd, London (2003).
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