Allanol Always: Anya Paintsil's Textural Homecoming

This summer, Welsh-Ghanaian textile artist Anya Paintsil returns to her hometown of Wrexham for Allanol Always, a groundbreaking solo exhibition at Tŷ Pawb Art Gallery running until 25 October 2025. The show represents both a homecoming and a bold artistic statement, as Paintsil develops an entirely experimental body of work that challenges the art world's problematic relationship with Black creativity.

The exhibition's Welsh title, meaning "outside" or "external," is deliberately provocative. Paintsil uses this concept to confront how African art has been positioned as "outsider art" within Western art history - an othering she directly challenges through her textile practice. The word also resonates with her personal experience of navigating identity as a woman of colour, even within her own hometown.

Anya Paintsil: The Aura on Her, 2025. Acrylic, wool, fabric, found denim, found leather, synthetic hair on poly-cotton.

Central to Paintsil's practice is the fusion of traditional craft techniques learned in her North Wales childhood - rug making, appliqué, and hand embroidery - with Afro hair styling methods to create bold, textural portraits. This unique approach draws from the Fante tradition of figurative textiles while incorporating visual languages rooted in Kongo masks, Aku'aba dolls, and Asafo flags...

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Image Credits: Anya Paintsil, Except Now I'm Drinking £21.99 Tokaji From Waitrose, 2023

All other images as credited in photo captions.