Stories of Innovation: Fabrication in Africa and Beyond

What is it about?

This chapter explores textiles in Africa as a visual art form that remains distinctive, innovative, and vibrant in traditions that preserve cultural identity. There has always been a fertile exchange in Africa of reciprocal influences between cultures, leading to innovation in textiles and textile design, contemporary visual practice, and leadership arts. The chapter describes the works of El Anatsui, Abdoulaye Konate, Kwesi Owusu‐Ankomah, Papa Essel, Dorothy Akpene Amenuke, Patrick Tagoe‐Turkson, and Ibrahim Mahama in the textile field. El Anatsui is the most highly acclaimed living African artist. He found the indigenous traditions at the NationalCultural Centre, Kumasi more meaningful and inspiring. Abdoulaye Konate, born in Dire, Mali in 1953, transforms the weaving traditions of Mali into contemporary media that are charged with gravitas. Since the mid‐1990s, the award‐winning artist has successfully imbued his work with an indigenous Malian identity as well as conferring his own identity upon his textile‐inspired art.

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