In a recent exhibition, I showed a series of works titled: Motherhood: Sweet, Sour, and Strong. This series is inspired by a West African song I first heard as a little girl: “Sweet Mother.” The song is a tribute to the songwriter’s mother, celebrating both the joys and the hardships of motherhood. That duality – its sweetness and its struggles – became the heart of this body of work.
In this series, I explore the layered realities of motherhood: its tenderness, its sacrifices, and its quiet strength. To do this, I designed a collection of fabrics using fruit as recurring motifs. Each fruit carries symbolic meaning.
I chose a pineapple for sweetness, lemon for sourness, and orange for strength and resilience. Additionally, throughout the fabric designs that I created, I weave the Ghanaian Adinkra symbol called Obaa Tan Pa, which represents the “good mother” into them.
Motherhood: who, truly, is a good mother?
That question opened up a deeper inquiry for me. If society views motherhood one way from the outside, how do mothers themselves define what it means to be good? This tension, between the idealized image of motherhood and the lived experience, became the central thread of the work.
From my own experience as a mother, I’ve come to understand that sacrifice alone is not the only way most mothers would like to live their lives, nor should it be the standard used to honor them. Mothers need rest, gentleness, and the freedom to be fully human. They do not need to be superhuman or to “do it all” at the cost of their well-being.
To give form to this contrast between the ideal and the real, I created two groupings within the series.
The pieces in this post belong to the first grouping: the idealized notion of the “Good Mother.”
I’ll soon share with you the second grouping which is rooted in the realities of everyday motherhood. They’re in contrast to these pieces shown here, both in technique and in intent. Visually, there are also very different from these ones showed here.
I can’t wait for you to see this second grouping of works that were in my exhibition “Restitching the Narrative“.
Love this motherhood series
That means a lot to me.
I like the way you tell the story behind your work.
Without the stories, non-artistic eyes like mine only see a woman with her hairdo!
I had to look closely to find the Obaa tan pa symbol. The pineapple, lemon and orange….who knew!
I’m thankful for artists and friends like you who help me appreciate art.
Glad to hear that you like my storytelling. I think there are different ways people appreciate art. Some enjoy the visual impact of the work – the colors, composition, etc. And there are others who enjoy going deeper to understand the process and the artist’s thinking behind their work. And I think all of these ways are valid ways of appreciating art. No right or wrong way.