Unit Three: Studying Africa through the Humanities

Module Twelve: African Art

Student's Edition

Kente Cloth in Ghana and American Connections

Figure 1: Detail of a man's kente cloth. This cloth design is called Adweneasa, which can be translated as "my skills are exhausted." Collection of the Fowler Museum of Cultural History, UCLA. Photo by Don Cole.

Figure 2: Detail of a man's kente cloth. This design features the very popular Oyokoman pattern. It takes its name from the Oyoko clan, which has produced every Asantehene (Asante king) and queen mother cloth since the 17th century. Its color combinations coincides with the that of the Ghanaian flag. Collection of the Fowler Museum of Cultural History, UCLA. Photo by Don Cole.

Figure 3. Detail of a woman's kente cloth. Collection of the National Museum of African Art, National Museum of Natural History, purchased with funds provided by the Smithsonian Collections Acquisitions Program 1982-85.

Figure 4. Ewe man's cloth, 1997. Collection of the Newark Museum. Purchase by Mrs. Parker O Griffith Bequest fund.

Figure 5. Asante omanhene (paramount chief) at a durbar.
Kumasi, Ashanti. January 19, 1980.
Photo by R.A. Silverman

Figure 6. Asante omanhene (paramount chief) at a durbar.
Kumasi, Ashanti. January 19, 1980.
Photo by R.A. Silverman

Figure 7. Asante omanhene (paramount chief) at a durbar.
Kumasi, Ashanti. January 19, 1980.
Photo by R.A. Silverman