6/24/2010 Kente cloth production: A wonder to behold

Kente cloth production: A wonder to behold

Published: Thursday, June 24, 2010, 9:17 AM Updated: Thursday, June 24, 2010, 9:20 AM

Tevah Platt

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6/24/2010 Kente cloth production: A wonder to behold

Francis Marfoh demonstrates the Ghanaian art of kente weaving. (Staten Island Advance/Tevah Platt)
STATEN ISLAND, NY - RICHMOND - Perched in the center of a long, narrow loom, Francis Marfoh paddled two foot-treadles and w orked
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6/24/2010 Kente cloth production: A wonder to behold
school-bus yellow thread into a kente cloth pattern last week, onlookers around him marveling. This art had been his full-time trade in his
native village of Bonw ire, the center of kente production in w estern Ghana.

For practical reasons - Where do you get the tools? Where do you store a 10-foot loom? And how do you price a cloth that takes three months
to make? - Marfoh and other kente w eavers living on Staten Island rarely get opportunities to apply their w eaving skills, or to pass them along
to their children.

But in the U.S., their skills present them w ith the opportunity to demonstrate both their artisan craft and their culture.

Plans are underw ay for a public kente cloth art exhibit to be held on Staten Island.

Members of the Staten Island Handspinners and Weavers Guild got first peek at local kente samples as they joined the Council on the Arts and
Humanities for Staten Island (COAHSI) in hosting Staten Island's Ghanaian weavers for a kente cloth discussion and demonstration at Historic
Richmond Tow n.

In addition to Marfoh, the tradition-bearers included Anthony Oti Kagya, Nana Adu-Bofour, all of Port Richmond, and Ghanaian Civic
Association trustee Sam Owusu-Sekyere of West Brighton.

Marfoh said he didn't remember learning the craft since boys in his village were brought into the trade at an early age, starting to spin cotton
around age 6. In Bonwire, kente has traditionally been a men's art since the 16th century; girls, they said, are taught that weaving could make
them barren - a sort of reversal of the old American concept that childless w omen become spinsters.

In Ghana, kente cloth was at first reserved for high priests and royalty.

It consists of intricately w oven strips that are sometimes sew n together to make toga-like garments, w ith flamboyantly vibrant colors and
infinite patterns, many of them symbolic.

Black-and-w hite kentes are w orn at funerals, said Ow usu-Sekyere, to represent both mourning and celebration.

In the United States, kente cloth has become an iconic symbol of Africa.

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6/24/2010 Kente cloth production: A wonder to behold
"We feel honored to present part of our culture," said Ow usu-Sekyere, w ho estimates about 2,000 Ghanaians live on Staten Island.

"This is amazing," said Lisa Grupico of West Brighton, a member of the w eavers' guild. "This is a very basic loom but they take w eaving to
another level."

The loom w as made by a carpenter at Wagner College, David Riccardi, who built it from a photograph of an original. A few of the loom's
accessory parts came from Ghana, including bamboo shuttles, palm beams and a Chef Boyardee can used to suspend threading.

Local Ghanaians believe the kente loom may have been the first constructed on American soil. Said COAHSI's folklorist, Christopher Mulé:
"Material culture is an important part of the folk arts and to have these guys from Bonw ire, the capital of the kente cloth tradition, is a goldmine
for Staten Island."

Demonstration of the Ghanaian art of kente w eaving. (Staten Island Advance/Tevah Platt)

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