Savannah African Art Museum is hosting a marketplace every Friday leading up to Kwanzaa, which is from Dec. 26 to Jan. 1. The marketplace will take place on Dec. 2, 9, 16, and 23, from 12-4 p.m. on the second floor of the Terracotta Gallery, located at 201 East 37th Street in Savannah.
Each marketplace will feature different vendors from the local and regional community and is free to the public. This is on the second floor, and it is stair-access only.
The Dec. 16 vendor will be William Kwamena-Poh, a fine artist and Ghana native. In a 2019 interview with Do Savannah, Kwamena-Poh said he wasn't necessarily born into art. His grandfather was known to possess some talent, but he'd died long before William was born, and his father was a history professor. Somehow, though, Kwamena-Poh found himself drawn to self-expression at a very young age. "In my spare time or when I was down, I [would] go sit somewhere quiet and draw," he reflected, "And that's how [it] developed.
“What I’m trying to do is an indirect documentation of fishermen, and their storied lives,” he said, “And I can use Ghana. I don’t know about any other place, but I grew up in Ghana. At the end of the day you want a window that you can show people that you are familiar with.”
But for Kwamena-Poh, it’s about more than just depicting the people of his homeland. It’s about connecting. “I want to keep showing my culture so that we can understand each other better. To make sure that when I shake your hand, I give you a little bit of me, you give me a little bit of you, and we get a little bit of understanding of each other, and the paintings do the rest.”
Credit: Molly Hayden / For Savannah Morning News
Credit: Molly Hayden / For Savannah Morning News
“Kwanzaa is an African American celebration of family, community, and culture. It is based on the agricultural celebrations of Africa, called 'first fruits' celebrations which were times of harvest, ingathering, reverence, commemoration, recommitment, and celebration,” said the museum’s Education and Community Outreach Liaison, Lisa Jackson. “We invite the community to come take a tour and visit our marketplace featuring a vast array of vendors bringing patrons unique creative cultural art and goods.”
The Savannah African Art Museum is a non-profit institution devoted to spreading awareness and appreciation of African culture. They hold a collection of over 1,000 objects that hail from West and Central Africa. The museum's collection spans over 28 countries and represents over 180 cultures. For more information about the museum, access virtual tours, workshops, and initiatives, please visit www.savannahafricanartmuseum.org or follow them on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Pinterest using the handle @SavannahAfricanArtMuseum.
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Savannah African Art Museum to host Kwanzaa marketplace with William Kwamena-Poh
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