page_title: Culture of Africa
section_title: African arts and crafts
hierarchical_section_title: Culture of Africa / African arts and crafts
caption_attribution_description: English: SUDAN basket -tray ,tabar of weaved natural plant fibre, coloured in different colours
context_page_description: The culture in Africa is varied and manifold, consisting of a mixture of countries with various tribes that each have their own unique characteristic from the continent of Africa. It is a product of the diverse populations that today inhabit the continent of Africa and the African Diaspora. African culture is expressed in its arts and crafts, folklore and religion, clothing, cuisine, music and languages. Expressions of culture are abundant within Africa, with large amounts of cultural diversity being found not only across different countries but also within single countries. Even though African cultures are widely diverse, they are also, when closely studied, seen to have many similarities; for example, the morals they uphold, their love and respect for their culture as well as the strong respect they hold for the aged and the important, i.e. kings and chiefs.
  Africa has influenced and been influenced by other continents. This can be portrayed in the willingness to adapt to the ever-changing modern world rather than staying rooted to their static culture.
context_section_description: Africa has a rich tradition of arts and crafts. African arts and crafts find expression in a variety of woodcarvings, brass and leather art works. African arts and crafts also include sculpture, paintings, pottery, ceremonial and religious headgear and dress. Maulana Karenga states that in African art, the object was not as important as the soul force behind the creation of the object. He also states that All art must be revolutionary and in being revolutionary it must be collective, committing, and functional.
  Certain African cultures have always placed emphasis on personal appearance and jewelry has remained an important personal accessory. Many pieces of such jewelry are made of cowry shells and similar materials. Similarly, masks are made with elaborate designs and are an important part of some cultures in Africa. Masks are used in various ceremonies depicting ancestors and spirits, mythological characters and deities.
  In many traditional arts and craft traditions in Africa, certain themes significant to those particular cultures recur, including a couple, a woman with a child, a male with a weapon or animal, and an outsider or a stranger. Couples may represent ancestors, community founder, married couple or twins. The couple theme rarely exhibits intimacy of men and women. The mother with the child or children reveals intense desire of the women to have children. The theme is also representative of mother mars and the people as her children. The man with the weapon or animal theme symbolizes honor and power. A stranger may be from some other tribe or someone from a different country, and more distorted portrayal of the stranger indicates proportionately greater gap from the stranger.
caption: Sudan basket-tray, tabar of weaved natural plant fiber, in different colors
exif: {"Image Software": "Picasa", "Image DateTime": "2015:12:09 20:29:51", "Image Artist": "Picasa", "Image ExifOffset": "96", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "364", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "6064", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2015:12:09 20:03:07", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "4849", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2253", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "Interoperability RelatedImageWidth": "5120", "Interoperability RelatedImageLength": "2880", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "228", "EXIF ImageUniqueID": "95ad545d7f6ace71750bd9bbe0dc1bb7"}