Monday, 5 April 2010

KENTE CLOTH ADANUDO, EWE, GHANA

Strip-woven cotton, before 1900

Museum Purchase, 2002 Eric D. Robertson African Arts, NYC

The Asanti of Ghana are famous for their colorful and elaborate Kente cloth.Their Neighbors, the Ewe, produced even more intricate Kente cloth. The designs in the center of the panels are created with supplementary weft threads; most are abstract but some are zoomorphic or anthropomorphic: a fish, a butterfly, a hand. An adanudo could not be purchased in the marketplace; it was commissioned at very high cost by a high-ranking elder. This heirloom wrapper is over one hundred years old and of breathtaking quality. The Ewe stopped weaving cloths like this around 1960.

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