History

While the Dutch wax prints are now found everywhere in African urban and rural centres its history is a veritable expression of trade narratives. When the Dutch colonised Indonesia they found an indigenous art-form practised by women everywhere. Drawing patterns and handmade clothes with embellishments of wax was of meditational value. The colourful prints made their way into Dutch factories in the 1700s and from there a growing business into African markets was born.  African prints have a longer history. 3000 years ago Kente cloth producers of Ghana were weaving cloth but not with wax. With skills gained from the trade winds from the 15th century, local West African indigenous knowledge on clothing integrated with European industrial capacities and born was the African wax print rage. The quintessential African fabric is now a proudly-adorned symbol for African solidarity/black consciousness. Notice how after Ghana’s independence (1958)  celebrations even Gamal Abdel  Nasser (Egypt) and Julius Nyerere (Tanzania) adorned the West African garb in abeyance to African solidarity. So have Malcolm X, Storkley Carmichael and indeed Barak Obama! The rest as they say is history. Today, all over Africa, in European metropoles, in Japanese art houses and further afield, wax prints  capture catwalks, street-wise fashionistas, reflect the back-to-the-roots value, and are found in glossy women’s magazines. The Wax print has arrived!