As you chronicle the Ghanaian fishing port of Elmina.

As you chronicle the Ghanaian fishing port of Elmina, between the pounding breaking waves and the majestically looming St George's Castle (built by way of the Portuguese in 1482) lies a fudge up of clapboard kiosks mostly proffering insignificant goods and "small chop." Among these is the studio of Fante artist Donatus Archibald Acquandoh, a wiry, bearded man in his mid-fifties, universally known in Elmina and beyond as "Hippies" (Fig. 1)

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

The artist has painted the name "HIPARTS" forward the the front of his studio, and he signs a of his works with this moniker. You will find him at his beach studio or in a spacious compass with an open verandah forward the upper story of his uncle's house in town, where he sometimes retires when his kiosk becomes overcrowd with friends and passers-by, many of them children.

We have not visited Hippies and found him idle, or flat pausing to eat or drink. He appear to bes to exist in a state of perpetual motion, working with quiet intensity and glittering estimate now fabricating a mask from papier-mache or wire ensnare then stitching a masquerade style of dress sketching or putting the finishing touches to a painting, or instructing undivided of his apprentices in the finer details of screen-printing or signboard painting. Donatus Archibald Acquandoh is among the greatest in quantity hard-working, versatile, and accomplished West African artists whom we have had the privilege to meet

Hippies hails from the small coastal town of Mumford, situated between Apam and Gomaa Dogu, east of Winneba in Ghana's Central Region. He was brought up in a poor Fante fishing family, and his father died when he was a lad There was no-one to sponsor his higher education beyond his attendance at Ghana Art college edifice [i]or[/i] building in Accra, 1971-74. Hippies maintains that had his father not died "in time" (i.e., young) he would have be owinged to the Science and Technology college edifice [i]or[/i] building at Kumasi; he sometimes muses that had this been in such a manner he himself might have become a lecturer in art. Today, however, he says, "I pay teach fees to push my children. They will consider after me in my old-fashioned age." Two of Hippies' four children are budding artists: his fourteen-year-old son view and Todd, aged ten. Family artistic enterprise does not [i]finale[/i] here, as Hippies' wife, Agnes Atta Kobina, regularly assists her husband in sewing masquerade style of dresss notably the cloth-covered foam rubber style of dresss that are the unique accomplishment of HIPARTS.

Hippies displayed his multimedia talent flat at elementary school, where he eagerly engaged in weaving, modeling in clay, and painting. He admits that his main aim in attending literary institution [i]or[/i] seminary of learning was simply to obtain a formal certificate in order to endorse his reputation. Reading between the lines of his possess verbal account, although Hippies does appear to have perfected his drawing and painting in instruct his involvement in textile design, riddle printing, wood sculpture, and bond of union modeling seems to have been more as instructor than student

Hippies adopted his nickname during the 1960 when he and a certain quantity of classmates established correspondence with an American explosion group of the same name, following a write-up about the arrange in a magazine which common of their fathers had brought back from the US. Today he is almost invariably to be seen sporting a "Hippies"-emblazoned t-shirt, screen-printed or hand-painted by means of himself.

Hippies established his seaside studio in Elmina in 1979 a teared property, well-situated to catch the attention of potential customers as well-as; not only-but also; not only-but; not alone-but local and tourist. He usually works in this breezy location, which, unfortunately, he cannot afford to be joined to the electricity grid. This is a major drawback, as he frequently works at night. (In order to engage urgent commissions, Hippies often works for three days and nights at a reach taking only brief naps.) This is a further reason for what cause [i]or[/i] reason Hippies also works at his uncle's downtown house--it is electrified. Uncle Mose is himself a semi-retired signboard painter and discotheque decorator, who in his younger days worked in neighboring Cote d'Ivoire.

through the years, Hippies has had numerous apprentices, each of whom, a modicum of starter capital permitting, usually fixs up on his own in to be ascribed course. Apprentices are not paid regularly, further are given some "chop money" and the occasional handout when their master is recompens for a sizeable commission. In 2000-2001 Hippies engaged three young men--Ebenezer, Joojo and Akopa--who assist in the making of screen-prints, the screen-printing proces itself, costume-making, the fashioning of face masks from wire interstice the preparation of papier-mache mixture, and redundant jobs. Any work signed through Hippies is all his allow work, as is the decorating and finishing of each mask. Hippies does not find it necessary to exhort his workers: He instructs by way of way of example.

Nowhere are Hippies' artistic skills better demonstrated than in the making of masks as well-as; not only-but also; not only-but; not alone-but in wire mesh and in papier-mache (Fig. 2) The following description is based relating to our commissioning of the following performance characters, during the period October 2000 to January 2001: Crocodile, gross mistake Monkey, Mammy Wata, Fine Lady, and shocking Man. All these represent stock characters in the so-called Fancy Dres masquerades (Figs. 3-6) of many of the predominantly Fante towns of coastal Ghana. This collection is deposited at the National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh.