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@sankofadesign
Experiment one! this is the first time i have ever done potato carving and stamps! i was actually pleasantly surprised. I was a bit frustrated in the beginning, considering that i had such an ordinate shape to start with. I would like to try to perfect the shape more, but for a first run i think i did well.
i must say i really do like the organic and kind of grunge look that the texture of the potato gave. right along my style!
Re-Opening the Case
So the case of the Sankofa has been reopened. I think its kind of funny that i keep ending up back up at this same place, making new connections and trying to figure out why personally i am so attached to this symbol and shape.
This tumblr started out as a term project for a design history class and now it has turned into this almost life long project that keeps following me from class to class.
The focus on this next project is about evocative objects. Things that bring certain emotions, memories or actions to people and why. I feel like because i have done so much research on the sankofa, it would only make sense to keep it going and really do something out of the box. This project and class is going to give me the chance to explore and use materials i never imagined to use. Hopefully i can keep this blog up during the semester and this project. it would be nice to have documentation!
So those of you still around and following this tumblr, i hope you enjoy the ride!
neverending!
It been pretty amazing finding random sankofas and how relevant its related to which its decorated on. Sankofa has always been a design i've liked and been drawn to, but to learn some new background on it and making my own conclusions have been slightly mind blowing. And its also always nice to share the information that im learning and how interested people become when i start speaking about it.
i am continuously finding ornamental sankofa designs all the time. it is NEVER ENDING! and its been so exciting to find it in friends and family's homes and to explain to them what exactly it is that they have in their house. with further explanation, they fall in love with their ornamental pieces even more. they love the philosophy of the sankofa and what it represents. some even looking for more design that replicates the symbol. i feel that within my circle of friends, family.. and even some people i have ran into because of this symbol, i have spark interest into history and representation that has not existed before.
Although this blog started out as a term project for my history of design art class, i feel like i will still visit and add to the information i have already discovered. a never ending process that i will continue to learn from and be amazed by.
Ornamental texture sankofas, iron work, sankofa doors, and a sankofa coat rack
Sankofas found in kitchens, drugs stores, and homes :) Its been fun, especially finding sankofas in homes and explaining to people why i want to take pictures of their ornamental art!
Something odd, something interesting
So as i was surfing the web last night, my cousin sent me a link on one of our favorite video games, Kingdom Hearts. We had been playing the game since it had first came out in 2005ish and followed the game and the multi-formats that have been released. More recently, for almost 6 years now we have been waiting for the release of the third installment of the console version of the game Kingdom Hearts III. As i was researching the page he sent me, it struck me then after all these years.... the logo title has a sankofa in it!
Its a little hard to see, but looking past the letters, it is the ornamental heart right behind it that compromises the design. The website that i was looking on happen to separate the design logo from the text to create their own logo for their site...
after contemplating this for a few moments, if this representation of heart was used on purpose, it would make absolute sense! Here's the summary of the video game:
The Destiny Islands are a beautiful paradise where children’s laughter abounds. Day after day, Sora, Riku and Kairi talk and dream of new places, new worlds beyond their islands.
They ponder the usual questions that adolescents do – about the world outside, about their own existence. Little do they know a great destiny awaits them.
One stormy night, a terrible darkness invades the Destiny Islands… Sora awakens in another world, in a place called Traverse Town. His hopes of seeing new worlds are realized, but his friends Riku and Kairi are nowhere in sight.
Meanwhile, Court Wizard Donald and Captain Goofy arrive from Disney Castle. Under their king’s orders, they are looking for the “key” and its owner, and they have a message from their king: “Now, there’s somebody with a ‘key’ – the key to our survival… We need that key.”
That “somebody” turns out to be Sora. To find Kairi and Riku, and discover what is happening to their worlds, Sora joins Donald and Goofy and embarks on an epic journey.
^ so to add to this in order to make sense with Sankofa.. many times during the game Sora has several flashbacks and lessons learned that help him on his journey... there for "in order to move into the future, you must learn from your past".
A lot of folks were blogging a few days ago about the Sankofa symbols that appear in metalwork in parts of the US (gate designs etc.)
After seeing this post (and discovering that it wasn’t in fact just an ornamental symbol, I noticed that my next-door neighbor’s house has a few window bars with the Sankofa worked into the design. My next door neighbor owns her house, and is one of the few black residents of this street that still does after Yale expanded its reach and bought up most of the houses for graduate students. I’m not entirely sure of the timeline, but it’s probably no coincidence that, even though most of these houses were built around the same time, this is the only house on the street with those particular window bars.
I wonder how many people overlook the sankofa symbols all around DC residential neighborhoods.
A lot of people do. Mr. Bechet, art professor and my former Freshman seminar teacher, told me about how this was standard for houses of Free People of Color around New Orleans. Basically, white people allowed these symbols because they didn’t really know what they were (they assumed that these were simply ornamental). And this sankofa symbol was constantly reproduced in African-American cast iron gate designs.
black slaves did a lot of the iron work you see around the south and in older homes in the north.
a lil something we brought with us being that we had been smelting iron b4 the europeans used water to wash their behinds.
Bolded emphasis, mine. I love when the things that we managed not to lose on the way over here show up all around us.
i always notice it, but never connected the dots!
I never knew what these meant, I have seen them everywhere and all of my life. Damn.
I never knew this
Here’s a pic i found of the sankofa symbol
all over the dominican republic you will see the same designs, particularly in lower class homes gates. so fucking interesting. my grandmothers front porch has got several of those.
reblogging again for the shit people look at but never see
holy shit. my own fence has this in it and I had no idea.
The railings on the house I’ve lived in for 18 years have these designs, I never knew anything about them until today.
^Very interesting to see the different responses from all kinds of people.
Ornamental?! oh no.
So... as i was surveying my Facebook crowd about seeing the design of the Sankofa symbol, someone commented about her fathers works.... Here is what I posted:
"Has anyone noticed or seen the sankofa symbol in various settings, even if its NOT identified as the symbol itself? or have you even SEEN a design that looks very simular to the curved swirls and curls? if you have and could provide ur insight on it or even pictures, i would love you forever.. it will be part of a project im working on and i will fully credit you."
and here is Shannon from New Jersey's response:
"In my fathers work all my life, he makes railings and ornamental ironwork...two scrolls back to back make a sankofa."
And BOOM my brain exploded. She said "ornamental"... and for whatever reason, that word.. that whole idea scares me. So is Sankofa considered ornamental design when the actual semiotics behind it is taken away?
Ornamental is described as a style that originates from baroque styles of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and the word baroque can also simply mean that something is elaborate with many details. So in the case of where ornamental ironwork and Sankofa is involved, if you take the the sankofa and break apart its components, many of them appear in very ornamental design works. But is it really just ornamental... or is there actual history and meaning behind using this symbol. and is there a connection as to why it is common, but only in certain areas?
While searching the term "Ornamental Sankofa" i came across tons of people speaking about seeing the symbol in iron works around their neighborhood. I guess i should also mention the neighborhoods these people were speaking of had to do with old heritage buildings and houses built by African-Americans in the southern area of USA. Most of what i found based on history were in the states of South Carolina and Louisiana. And most of these houses were built during Slave trades.
By now i feel like my project has taken a life of its own.... and in the mists of this... i found this quote:
"Hundreds of two- and three-dimensional adinkra patterns ornament Akan art forms, including wooden prestige objects, brass weights, jewelry and, most prominently, stamped textiles that are worn for important occasions, especially funerals. In their public contexts of use, objects decorated with adinkra symbols elicit specific proverbs and popular sayings by those knowledgeable in this visual language. Invented by the Asante, adinkra designs and their meanings have widespread appeal among the broader Akan population."-Christine Mullen Kreamer Curator, National Museum of African Art.
So IS there a reason why the sankofa in particular is used so many times over and over... and not only that, the use of them are continuously linked to African-American history... more to this theory soon :)
Sankofa. A Ghanaian adinkra symbol literally translating to “go back and take it” which is generally interpreted to mean “in order to know one’s future one must understand one’s past”. Ever since visiting Ghana, I have noticed sankofa throughout New York City.
So after all the internet searching in the world, i didnt even THINK to search tumblr. my mistake. i've found some very interesting things with people asking and making the same connections I am.
Sankofa.. an iron gate design?!
Now could this be incidental?
yes.. its strangely looks like part of a sankofa right? the curled edges that swoop up into a vase like shape towards the top. Eyebrow raising to say the least. But the real question is, was this done purposely? or was this design chosen by random? Many times, specially in iron gate design you may even see this common shape...
While searching the world wide web on this peculiar subject, i found a blogger in the uk that had some of the same ideal...
"I have seen it everywhere, and especially in places that it is not supposed to be so I want to reflect on reflection, or sankofa. Some of these places are burglar bars, old shelves (like the one in my aunt’s bathroom) and even tattoos. The interesting thing about sankofa is that if you don’t see it, the double entendre is mind-blowing.
If I’m right there are two symbols:
One is a heart and the other is a bird looking backward. There ar likely more but the meaning, to remember where you came from go back and fetch it, is profound. This means a lot in terms of the recent conversations about how pivotal family is to our own character. Regardless of your relationship strength, we all have one. Yet still the conventional application of this symbol specifically is amazing. If I ever get a tattoo, this power be it because the social experiment is uproarious beyond belief.
Imagine: The sankofa is on burglar bars. You are heading into a house to commit a burglary. For some reason you cannot complete the task. Some wise person, despite their noesis of the appearance of their situation, is wise enough to see you coming. Wisdom therefore tells you to “go back and fetch it”. You can’t get in. You have to go back where you came from.
The bird symbol is not as commonly used as the other, heart-like symbol. However, I love the symbolism of the idea of the sankofa regardless of which symbol is used. Hopefully someone else notices it as well." -http://brothertattoo.co.uk/sankofa-tattoo.
Oh i've noticed it alright. I've decided to spend some time around not only my neighborhood, but in LA as well just to snap some pictures and see just how many times this symbol will show up. stay tuned ;)
Although many adinkra have found their way into western tattoos, perhaps none is quite so elegant or well known as the sankofa symbol. The Akan proverb states "Se wo were fi na wosan kofa a, yenkyi" or "There is nothing wrong with learning from hindsight." The term sankofa comes from the words "san" (return), "ko" (go), and "fa" (look, seek, and take). The image of the mythological bird with its head bent looking backward has been interpreted and re-interpreted in several different ways. At times, it can symbolize the chief who can see all, even things behind him. It has also been used as a symbol for the Akan idea that the past can help to guide the future or the thought that, if a mistake has been made or something is forgotten, the wrong can be righted and that one can learn from experience. More recently, the sankofa symbol has also alluded to a historic past or heritage that is uniquely African and is remembered with an eye toward building the future. The pleasing symmetry of the abstract designs that typify many adinkra, along with their clean lines and the subtle visual cues as to their meanings, have made them ideal symbols in tattooing. Whether tattooed as a single symbol or as a group of related symbols, adinkra such as sankofa are typically done in solid black. When looking for a tattoo choice that so completely combines ancient and sometimes mythic images with a rich and often wry traditional wisdom, it is difficult to see what could surpass Akan adinkra.
The concept of SANKOFA is derived from King Adinkera of the Akan people of West Afrika. SANKOFA is expressed in the Akan language as "se wo were fi na wosan kofa a yenki."
Literally translated it means "it is not taboo to go back and fetch what you forgot".
"Sankofa" teaches us that we must go back to our roots in order to move forward. That is, we should reach back and gather the best of what our past has to teach us, so that we can achieve our full potential as we move forward. Whatever we have lost, forgotten, forgone or been stripped of, can be reclaimed, revived, preserved and perpetuated.
Visually and symbolically "Sankofa" is expressed as a mythic bird that flies forward while looking backward with an egg (symbolizing the future) in its mouth.
The Meaning:
The Sankofa symbol is from the Adinkra tribe in Africa. The Sankofa represents the idea of looking to your past with understanding that both the good and the bad has helped you become who you are today. It encourages one to embrace all that they have been through and to respect the generations that have come before them.
