Daniel Mensah, also known as Hello, is a Ga carpenter and fantasy coffin artist. He works as an independent artist and carpenter in Teshie, Greater Accra, Ghana.
Daniel Mensah, also known as Hello, is a Ga carpenter and fantasy coffin artist. He works as an independent artist and carpenter in Teshie, Greater Accra, Ghana.
Born in 1968 in Teshie, Daniel Mensah did his six-year apprenticeship from 1984 until 1990 with the Ga coffin artist Paa Joe who was trained by Kane Kwei (1924-1992) in Teshie. When Mensah finished his apprenticeship, he worked for eight years with Paa Joe in Nungua as a master carpenter until he opened in 1998 his own studio called "Hello Design Coffin Works" in Teshie. Mensah participated in various art exhibitions in Europe and in some European film projects, like "Sépulture sur mesure" from Philippe Lespinasse. Some of his fantasy coffins are in the collection of the British Museum in London, in the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts in Norwich and in private art collections. [1]
A coffin is a funerary box used for viewing or keeping a corpse, either for burial or cremation.
The Ga-Dangbe, Gã-Daŋbɛ, Ga-Dangme, or GaDangme are an ethnic group in Ghana, Togo and Benin. The Ga and Dangbe people are grouped respectively as part of the Ga–Dangme ethnolinguistic group. The Ga-Dangmes are one ethnic group that lives primarily in the Greater Accra of Ghana. Ethnic Ga family names (surnames) include Nikoi, Amon, Kotey, Kotie, Adei, Kutorkor, Oblitey, Lartey, Nortey, Aryee, Poku and Lamptey. The following are names derived from the ethnic Dangme and common among the Ningos Nartey, Tetteh, Kwei, Kweinor, Kwetey, Narteh, Narh, Dugbatey, Teye, Martey, Addo, Siaw, Saki, Amanor, Djangba. These are aligned to the ethnic Ga as well: Lomotey, Tetteh, Ankrah, Tetteyfio, Laryea, Ayitey, Okai, Bortey, Quaye, Quaynor, Ashong, Kotei, Sowah, Odoi, Ablor, Adjetey, Dodoo, Darku and Quartey.
Tatlinʼs Tower, or the project for the Monument to the Third International (1919–20), was a design for a grand monumental building by the Russian artist and architect Vladimir Tatlin, that was never built. It was planned to be erected in Petrograd after the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, as the headquarters and monument of the Comintern.
Teshie is a coastal town in the Ledzokuku Municipal District, a district in the Greater Accra Region of southeastern Ghana. Teshie is the ninth most populous settlement in Ghana, with a population of 171,875 people.
Eric Adjetey Anang is a Ghanaian sculptor and fantasy coffin carpenter. He was born in Teshie, Ghana and runs the Kane Kwei Carpentry Workshop. He currently maintains dual residency and splits his time between Ghana and Madison, Wisconsin, where he is pursuing unique projects.
The Kane Kwei Carpentry Workshop is a studio established in Teshie, Ghana, since the 1950s. It is known for its design coffins that became symbolic of African artistic creativity. It featured the talents of several artists who would go on to gain fame as fantasy coffin sculptors, including Paa Joe, Kane Kwei, Eric Kwei, Cedi Kwei, and the lead of the shop at Kane Kwei's death, Theophilius Nii Anum Sowah.
Kudjoe Affutu is a Ghanaian artist and figurative coffin and palanquin builder. He was born and still lives in Awutu Bawyiase, Central Region, Ghana. Affutu has made a name for himself in Europe by participating in various art projects and exhibitions.
Regula Tschumi is a Swiss social anthropologist and art historian.
Ataa Oko Addo was a Ghanaian builder of figurative palanquins and figurative coffins, and at over 80 years of age he became a painter of Art Brut.
The Caplan Collection of folk art and childhood artifacts is held by The Children's Museum of Indianapolis; in 1984 it was donated by Frank and Theresa Caplan, owners of the Creative Playthings toy company. The museum began accessioning the collection in January 1985. The collection consists of nearly 32,000 objects, from toys to dolls to games to musical instruments to masks to clothing to folk art from over 120 different countries. The museum created a specific exhibit for the collection, entitled "Passport to the World," which opened in 1986. Initially the Caplans had intended for the collection to be the basis of a new Museum of Fantasy and Play, but this never materialized and they donated their collection to the Children's Museum instead. The Caplans spent about US$1 million acquiring the objects from around 1965 to 1985; some of the countries strongly represented are Japan, Mexico, Russia, Germany, Indonesia, and India.
The Sainsbury Institute for Art (SIfA) is based in the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts at the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom.
Fantasycoffins or figurative coffins, also called “FAVs” and custom, fantastic, or proverbial coffins, are functional coffins made by specialized carpenters in the Greater Accra Region of Ghana. These colorful objects, which developed out of figurative palanquins, are not only coffins but considered works of art. They were shown for the first time to a wider Western public in the exhibition Les Magiciens de la terre at the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris in 1989. The seven coffins shown in Paris were made by Kane Kwei (1922–1992) and his former assistant Paa Joe (b.1947). Since then, coffins by Kane Kwei, his grandson Eric Adjetey Anang, Paa Joe, Daniel Mensah, Kudjoe Affutu, Theophilus Nii Anum Sowah, Benezate, and other artists have been displayed in international art museums and galleries around the world.
Paa Joe is a Ghanaian figurative palanquin and fantasy coffin artist born 1947 at Akwapim in the Eastern Region of Ghana. Paa Joe is considered one of the most important Ghanaian coffin or abebuu adekai artists of his generation. He has been involved in the international art world since 1989, and has been included in major exhibitions in Europe, Japan, and the USA. His fantasy coffins are in the collections and on permanent display in many art museums worldwide, including the British Museum in London, the Brooklyn Museum in New York, The Royal Ontario museum in Canada ,Museum of fine Art in Boston ,the National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka and many others as well as the private collections of foreign dignitaries. paa Joe is building an Art academy and gallery to support the community and art students across the globe
A figurative palanquin connected with the totem of its owner is a special kind of litter used in the Greater Accra Region in Ghana. These palanquins called in the Ga language okadi akpakai belong to the royal insignias and are used only by the Ga kings or mantsemei and their sub-chiefs when they are carried in public at durbars and festivals like Homowo. With these figurative palanquins the Ga create ethnic differences between themselves and their Akan neighbours that only use simple boat- or chair-shaped litters.
James Dodds is an East Anglian artist whose practice centers on painting, linocut and relief carving. Born in Brightlingsea, Essex, he now lives and works in Wivenhoe producing prints and books as the Jardine Press. He is the son of East Anglian artist Andrew Dodds and has been described as "boatbuilding’s artist laureate". He is arguably East Anglia's most famous contemporary artist after Dame Maggi Hambling.
A Ghanaian film poster is a film poster hand-painted in Ghana used to advertise films produced in Ghana as well as world cinema. Ghanaian film posters, particularly hand-painted posters from the 1980s and 1990s, have become noted for their imaginative and unique artistry. They have been exhibited around the world in galleries and museums in Los Angeles, New York, Hong Kong, San Francisco, Chicago, and across Europe.
Mathers Museum of World Cultures was a museum of ethnography and cultural history that features exhibitions of traditional and folk arts at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. It also offered practicum studies at the university for graduate and undergraduate students. The museum also worked to promote local artists. In 2020, the Mathers Museum officially merged with the Glenn A. Black Laboratory of Archaeology and was closed for renovations. The combined institutions are now the new Indiana University Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology (IUMAA). Located at 416 North Indiana Avenue, the IUMAA is scheduled to reopen in 2023.
Alison Dunhill is an English artist and art historian, and also a published poet.
Theophilus Nii Anum Sowah is a Ghanaian figurative palanquin and fantasy coffin artist. Nii Anum was the chief apprentice in the Kane Kwei Carpentry Workshop where he worked ahead of other artists like Paa Joe.