Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe'', ''My God Affirms, When I Agree": Chi, Creativity, and Cosmic Nexus in the Art and Thought of Chiagoziem Nneamaka Orji: The Way of the Calabash 5
Oluwatoyin Adepoju
in
Chiagoziem Nneamaka Orji's Onye
Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, ''My God Affirms, When I Agree"
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Compcros
Comparative Cognitive Processes and Systems
Abstract
Chiagoziem Nneamaka Orji’s multimedia creativity in Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, ''My God Affirms, When I Agree", offers a profound visual meditation on the Igbo concept of chi—the personal divine essence and guardian force that embodies each individual’s unique connection to the Creator.
By balancing a calabash on her head, the artist evokes chi as the wellspring of consciousness, creativity, and life propulsion. Delicate tendrils, roots, radiate from this vessel, tracing pathways of spiritual energy across her face and eyes, linking Igbo Odinani cosmology with universal ideas of inner vision, chakras, and the transformative power of perception.
This work bridges fate and free will, physical and spiritual sight, and the dynamic forces of the god and goddess Agwu and Anyanwu (creativity and inspiration). It celebrates the human being as a microcosm where infinite divine potentials intersect with embodied existence, inviting viewers to contemplate the hidden capacities of sight, imagination, and speech in navigating life’s possibilities.
On waking every morning, I meditate on the marvellous self portrait by Chiagoziem Nnaemeka Orji titled Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, which may be translated from Igbo as ''I Affirm and My God Agrees''. It is translated by Chinua Achebe in his novel Things Fall Apart as ''When a Person Says 'Yes', their Chi Says 'Yes' ''. Ada Obi renders it in a personal communication as ''My God Agrees, When I Agree'' and "Destiny Affirms When I Agree.'' Charles Ogu presents it in a private communication as ''Onye Kwe-(Whoever) Says Yes, his Chi Will Affirm''. He interprets it as also meaning ''The agentive role of the individual is his destiny''. The expression is a profound engagement in Igbo thought with relationships between the human being and the divine, between fate and free will.
I am perpetually captivated by the self portrait's combination of visual beauty and range of meaning. I am continually moved afresh by its aesthetically powerful convergence of the individualistic, the rural, the domestic, the sacred and the cosmic.
This work echoes the milkmaid motif- a young woman carrying a calabash of milk on her head- once made visible in Nigerian art as an indigenization of that art through a focus on local and contemporary subjects. In this piece, the reverberations of this motif reaches a fusion of the literal and the symbolic, the realistic and the abstract.
The evocative potential of a self portrait is mobilised through digital reworking to arrive at a profound cosmological image. The individualisation of images originating from beyond the individual generates a powerful symbolic field. Rising from the generative capacity of Igbo art and thought a personal actualisation of communally developed cosmologies is created, unifying African and Western thought systems, and reverberating beyond even those into a global network of associations.
Chiagoziem Orji's Emergence from the Nexus of the Nsukka Art School and Indigenous Igbo Spirituality and Art
Orji
is an artist as well as an indigenous Igbo philosophy and spirituality thinker, as evident in her art and writings on Facebook and X. A graduate of the art school of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, she carries forward, in her own distinctive way, the artistic, spiritual and intellectual culture of that school, inspired as it is by the imaginative, spiritual and general cognitive culture of Igbo civilization as exemplifying endogenous African creativity.
This is a vision birthed by the pioneering figure of Uche Okeke, further developed by the multicultural explorations of such persons as Obiora Udechukwu, developed in varied directions by the artistic and intellectual genius of such other figures as Olu Oguibe, Chuu Krydz Ikwuemesi, and achieving a height of global visibility in the intellectual and curatorial work of Chika Okeke-Agulu and the art of El Anatsui ( ).
The indigenous Igbo artistic and communication form Uli has been strategic to Nsukka artists as emblematic of the endogenous African creativities they draw upon as they create their own expressive languages. Uli is complemented in this repertoire by Nsibidi, from the Ejagham and Efik of the Cross-River region of Nigeria and the neighbouring areas of Cameroon.
Orji's art thus embodies the academic lineage of the Nsukka school as well as the ancestral orientations of those whom Robin Sanders describes as the Uli women of Nigeria ( The Legendary Uli Women of Nigeria: Their Life Stories in Signs, Symbols, and Motifs ). Central for Orji among those women is Eziafo Okaro. Michael Chukwudera references Orji as inspired by Okaro's lines, which the younger artist is quoted as stating she finds “harmonic and rhythmic”, further describing that inspirational influence as motivating her “to be creative and free, to not restrict yourself” ( Michael Chiadoziem Chukwudera, "An Igbo Painter Awakens the Native Imagination: The Philosophical Art World of Chiagoziem Nneamaka Orji", Open Country Mag).
Chukwudera's 20225 article provides an expansive contextualisation of Orji's work:
The Igbo arts scene is a small but vibrant one. The artists, many of whom started in universities in the Igbo homeland of southeastern Nigeria, take inspiration from established traditions dating to the 1950s and ‘60s, including the Nsukka Art School and the New Nsukka Art School of uli artists, the Mbari Club sited in Ibadan but of Igbo impetus, and the Asele Arts Institute. Orji is a spiritual descendant of the Nsukka Art School, as is the more academically influenced Igbobinna Eze, whose exploration of Igbo cosmology in hyperrealistic and abstract paintings has helped resuscitate uli-graphy.
There are Samuel Nnorom, the textile sculptor, and Ndidi Dike, the veteran sculptor, painter, video, and mixed media artist. Chuma Anagbado’s phygital art mixes the physical and the digital to narrate stories. Among a growing number of artists working exclusively in the digital realm, converting their work to digital tokens like NFTs, is Osinachi, the continent’s leading crypto artist and an Nsukka graduate.
But it is in hyperrealism that the genre produced its biggest viral stars, including Arinze Stanley, detailing pencil and charcoal portraits, and Ken Nwadiogbu, who adds bold colours to his own black-and-white paintings, as well as prodigies, like Mayor Olajide who broke out online at 17. Together, their works run the gamut of culture and identity, from the traditional subjects of mythology, politics, and colonialism, to the modern turfs of race relations, sexuality, sexism, and consumerism.
This complete matrix of influences is evident in Oriji's work, in her Igbo culture centred art, in the Igbo spirituality and philosophy saturation of her thought, in dialogue with other streams of knowledge, in her use of Uli and Nsibidi symbolism in shaping her own body as a work of art, as Igbo women do with Uli and her creation of a symbol universe reworking those ancient expressive forms.
Body Art and Embodied, Terrestrially Grounded Yet Cosmically Sensitive Spirituality
Her self portraits often show her adapting the Igbo tradition of body art represented particularly by Uli, in projecting classical Igbo thought.
Her body art suggests an embodied and materially grounded yet cosmically sensitive spirituality represented by classical African thought but ranging beyond that to such Indian origin systems as Yoga and Hindu Tantra, in which the material cosmos is the platform of a ''far flying cosmic chariot'', adapting William Gray's The Office of the Holy Tree of Life, on the Jewish/Western esoteric Kabbalah, another such system conjoining human being, nature and spiritual cosmos.
Between Imaginative and Textual Visuality and the Ritual Archive
Imaginative and textual visuality are the complementary aspects of Orji's work. Her synergy of visual art and writing, on her own body, on her art and on virtual forms, as on Facebook and X, demonstrates a sensitivity to the power of various kinds of visuality-the imaginative and the textual.
Imaginative visuality is represented by the transformations of reality through her art, generating communicative velocity through visual delight and evocative force. Her textual
visuality consists in creating visual text complementing and expanding the semantic force of her visual art.
Ultimately Oji's art constitutes what Toyin Falola describes as a ritual archive, natural forms or examples of human creativity or a combination of both that ''constitute and shape knowledge about the visible
and invisible world [s]), coupled with
forces that breathe and are breathless'' ( ''Ritual Archives''). This suggests something both mysterious and concrete, pointing to something invisible while shaping what it points to, an archive that is both symbol and constituent of what it symbolizes.
Art like Orji's often references spiritual realities, and their intersection with the physical, a strategic example being Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, in which the relationship between the terrestrially grounded self and the spiritually located self is evoked through images bodying forth the invisible in terms of the visible-a calabash, roots, a human face and body and human, though mysterious hands.
Falola's interprets the evocative force of such a ritual archive as a balance of sacred enactment and knowledge reverberation encoded within the work of art and vibrating beyond it through contact with a sensitive human mind. This sums up superbly the power of such a work as Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe:
Objects and images encode the character of the being they represent. They are philosophical expressions, connected with thought and life, representing mentalities, power, and strength, which may move one towards the spiritual and religious through the aesthetic idea living within the image, enabling what Nietzsche calls an 'army of metaphors', generating a wide range of imaginations and thought systems.
Falola continues, incidentally focusing on the distinctive suggestive powers of such a work as Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe in its confluence of lofty spiritual imagination and broad ranging associative range through symbolism centred on the human body:
[ This process is exemplified ] by seeing an… image in terms of its projection of force and strength, of power, epistemic responses and metaphysical perceptions, insights about the body in its physical and non-physical realms, generating a conglomeration of texts, symbols and performances that allow us to understand the [ world embodied in that image] through various bodies of philosophies, literatures and histories...combining these disciplines in providing an understanding of the centres of [ their] epistemologies, unifying their ontologies and facilitating their [expression in ] theories of universal value.
Incidentally a superb summation of Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, which mobilizes the human body in conjunction with domestic and nature imagery in developing a tightly focused yet evocatively resonant sea of associations.
Incidentally, those lines are a superb summation of Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, which mobilizes the human body in conjunction with domestic and nature imagery in developing a tightly focused yet evocatively resonant sea of associations.
In conjunction with Orji's own explicitly stated ideas, the work of art develops an
epistemic and metaphysical framework, an orientation to the processes of knowing
and the character of the universe within which that process unfolds.
These epistemic and metaphysical possibilities are grounded in the ideational and expressive multiplicity
of Igbo thought and arts. They open, however, into the vastness of African ideational
and artistic discourse and its intersections with with the cognitive journey of
the human family, a matrix of possibilities this essay unfolds in terms of my own
understanding.
The Creative/Critical Matrix
Orji's work inspires for me an evocative force that provokes but goes beyond literal engagement with ideas. This essay presents my understanding of relationships between her work and the Igbo cultural universe it springs from, the extra-cultural ideas she complements the Igbo cosmos with and my sensitivity to the ramifications of her work beyond the explicit contexts in terms of which the artist develops it.
This effort constitutes the literal, expository, linear and art critical aspect of my relationship with Orji's work. The evocative power of her creativity, however, flows beyond the circumscriptions entailed by such conventional systems of expression in art criticism, art history and theory. Her art suggests an evocative range that cannot be adequately accounted for by expository, argumentative or analytical writing, the standard tools of scholarship.
The robustness of her response to the spiritual creativities of Igbo culture is so profound that, for me, meeting her in terms of an artistic response to her art is necessary, thereby better projecting the evocative power of her art and writing as triggers for cognitive initiations, introducing one to possibilities of mental restructuring not accessible by other means.
Hence I have developed the narrative series I have named ''The Way of the Calabash'', a journey into cognitive possibilities inspired by her work Onye Kwe Chi Ya Ekwe. This narrative series generates a quest into ultimate meanings inspired by synergies between Orji's self portrait and artistic and ideational worlds across cultures.
Detailed Exploration of Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe
A beautiful woman's face, that of the artist, centres Orji's Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, her eyes vitalistic in thoughtfulness, earnest in their gaze, the glow of skin and the symmetry of features highlighted and amplified by elegant inscriptions on her face, as those inscriptions flow downward from a calabash held above her head by two hands at either side of her face.
Chi, the Divine Self
Chi [ may therefore be understood as ] ''an infinitesimal manifestation of Chukwu's infinite essence given to each of us separately and uniquely, a single ray from the sun's boundless radiance" ( "Chi in Igbo Cosmology'', Morning Yet on Creation Day: Essays).
Each person is
''both a unique creation and the work of a unique creator… every
act of creation [ is] the work of a separate and individual agent, chi, a
personified and unique manifestation of the creative essence'', Chi Ukwu,
(Chukwu) the Great Chi.
Chi [ may therefore be understood as ] ''an infinitesimal manifestation of
Chukwu's infinite essence given to each of us separately and uniquely, a
single ray from the sun's boundless radiance" ( Chinua Achebe, "Chi in Igbo
Cosmology'', Morning Yet on Creation Day: Essays).
The radiance of gold and the glory of black conjoin in this painting by Orji to evoke the Igbo belief in the divine source of the human being in terms of a light connecting the baby and the baby's chi.
This light is visualized as a golden solar radiance, framed by an exquisite arabesque of cloud patterned by streams of white and gold. The golden globe emits white and gold rays, a golden light flowing onto the baby's middle, sinously dynamic like an umbilical cord linking the baby and the solar orb poised above.
Birds of gold are elegant in flight in the space between the solar luminary and the child, beauty of form and action evoking the elevated character of the world of chi from which the human being, represented by the baby, derives.
The blend of the gold of the sun and of the birds in flight highlight the dense blackness of the space against which they are outlined, a blackness that may suggest mystery, the difficulty of understanding such transcendent regions, the evocative force of black in this context similar to what Wole Soyinka describes in the Yoruba context as the abyss of transition, the zone between the material world where humans live and the spiritual world they come from which is often inaccessible to humans but which visionaries, such as artists like Orji may visualize and writers like Soyinka could verbally imagine (Soyinka, Myth, Literature and the African World; Death and the King's Horseman).
Spirals of cosmic rhythm and of recreation, of oscillations of matter and spirit, lines of convergence of glorious possibilities, against the matrix of space and time evoked by the grid on the child"s leg, examples of Orji's signature symbolism, are suggested by the inscriptions covering every inch of the space on the child's body and that of the hands holding the child aloft.
Those hands
evoke the hands holding aloft the chi calabash in Onye Kwe, Chi Ya
Ekwe, thereby evocative of possibilities in the child, possibilities
of reaching out to touch one's ultimate possibilities, guided by cultural
exposure, understood both in terms of immediate and more remotely developed
values.
English Romantic poet William Wordsworth evokes ideas of the origins of human mortality in divine immortality. He does this in terms of the image of a child and its nakedness at birth as suggesting metaphysical ideas.
These ideas and their imagistic expression resonate with Oriji's painting at the intersection of the image of the naked child and the evocation of its divine origin, archetypal conceptions, fundamental to humanity through biological experience, aspiration and visionary encounter, variously actualized across space, time and expressive forms:
Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:
The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar:
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home
....
Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the eternal Silence
....
Hence in a season of calm weather
Though inland far we be,
Our Souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither,
Can in a moment travel thither,
And see the Children sport upon the shore,
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore."
( "Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood")
A better understanding of the significance of the calabash being placed on the artist's head may be reached by reference to ''ori'', the Yoruba correlation with the Igbo ''chi''. Ori means ''head'', the head understood as both a biological and a spiritual centre. ''Ori lasan'' the ''head alone'', refers to the physical head as a biological centre, the point of concentration of the cognitive network of the body, the zone of conjunction of the body's nerve framework and without which the body cannot function adequately and the mind would not exist, in short, the axis of the human being as a materially embodied creature living in a material world.
''Ori lasan'' is the material vehicle for ''ori inu'', the ''inward head'', the head understood as representing the essence of the self as beyond physical biology, as beyond the material universe, as an immortal entity that lives beyond the physical birth and terrestrial transition of the individual in death.
The location of the calabash of chi on the artist's head in Orji's artistic piece is thus a dramatization of similar values in the chi concept, values more explicitly articulated by the Yoruba version of the same idea.
Another example of a powerful resonance with Orji's
Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe is Kashmiri poet
Abhinavagupta's celebration of the relationship between himself,
his parents
and the source of
the universe.
The Abhinavagupta correlation leads into the broader compass of Orji's art beyond the individualistic dimension represented by the personalisation of the chi concept as indicating the individual creator of each being.
The resonance between the individual, the ultimate creative centre represented by chi and the masculine and feminine potencies represented by human beings as they birth and nuture their children is incidentally highlighted by the Abhinavagupta correlation.
Orji's art features children, men, women and couples, lending itself to the conjunction with the Kashmiri Tantric master, an advocate of a view of the divine as embodied in humanity and actualized through amorous and erotic relationships between men and women.
Abhinavagupta celebrates the cosmic context of his birth:
May my heart, the core of my being, which is the core of all beings, the innermost awareness that animates all manifestation, shine forth.
The product of the exuberance of emotion due to the mating of my father and mother, embodying the bliss of the ultimate.
One with the state of absolute potential made manifest in the fusion of these two.
My father as Shiva, the foundation of being complete in himself, whose zest in creativity is manifest in her, my mother, as Shakti, the universal Divine Energy, which expresses its stamina in ever fresh creativity, radiant in ever new genesis.
My mother whose greatest joy was in my birth and my father when both were all embracing in their union.
May my heart which is the emission of vibrance from the couple and therefore full of the supreme nectar shine, expand as the totality of the bliss of the Absolute.
(Abhinavagupta's lines are presented through integrating various translations- Jaideva Singh's of Abhinavagupta's Paratrisika, Mark Dyzkowski, Christopher Wallis, Roger-Orphé Jeanty of his Tantraloka, Bettina Baumer's discussion of the sequence of passages in various books in Abhinavagupta's Hermeneutics of the Absolute and Alexis Sanderson's comprehensive analysis of the meaning of those lines within the religious tradition to which Abhinavagupta belongs in ''A Commentary on the Opening Lines of the Tantrasara of Abhinvavagupta.'')
Orji's painting of a
male and female couple incidentally evokes powerfully the sense of archetypal
masculine and feminine identity, associated with divine personages, that
Abhinavagupta's lines dramatize.
Instead of eyes and noses, the faces of Orji's couple are configured by a sheen of black, which covers their bodies, as their faces are shaped by an identical pattern of lines-the Nsibidi symbol for unity, signalling their relationship as a couple.
The man's two breasts are defined by spirals, which also occur on the woman's hand, evoking the recreative character of relationships between heterosexual couples in enabling the creation of new life, the passage between the world of spirit and the material world, dramatizing Orji's account of the meaning of spiral symbolism in her work:
The spiral embodies the rhythm of existence, a sacred symbol of continuity, ogwugwu, regeneration, reincarnation,
cosmic balance, and the eternal dialogue between the seen and unseen.
Found in Uli art and natural forms like the snail shell and the python (Eke), it mirrors the cycle of life, death, and rebirth.
The snail shell, coiled yet protective, represents spiritual refuge and the inward journey of the soul toward wisdom.
The python, sacred to the feminine principle, coils and uncoils with divine grace, symbolizing hidden power, fertility, and ancestral energy.
Together, they express the Igbo understanding that all life moves in circles, expanding, contracting, and regenerating in harmony with the cosmic order. The spiral teaches that nothing ends, everything transforms.
Evident on his neck,
chest and torso, as on the woman's neck and chest, are numerous straight lines,
suggesting the momentous potential of his role in the union of the
couple, '' The tiny lines you can see swimming on the figures
represents the coming together of different forces to achieve
something great '''IGWE BU IKE' '' as Orji states of similar
symbols on a human form in another work of hers, Amadiọha.
Near the man's wrists
are four grids of four small circles or seeds, making sixteen in all, which may
evoke the navigation of the structure and dynamism of space and time,
representing the material world, as actualized in the symbolism of the number
four in Igbo thought as indicating ''the Four Pillars of Time'',
demonstrated by the progression of time across the days, into weeks, months and
years, eventuating in the number four indicating ''ezumezu, ọganihu,
completion'', in relation to which the breaking of a kolanut into four parts is
critical in the Igbo kolanut ritual, as Orji describes her use of the symbolism
of the number four in her work Ochendo.
The grid structure may be seen as mobilizing those symbolic values and more in
exploring the dynamism of existence through the mechanics of Afa divination, in
which such a grid may suggest the permutations of the patterns assumed by the
divination instruments when cast, patterns based on quaternary relationships
summed up in terms of a primary sixteen permutations ( Angulu Onwuejeogwu, Afa Symbolism and Phenomenology in Nri Kingdom and Hegemony).
A man, as the head of the household in an indigenous Igbo context, would be the
priest of the family. He might not be a dibia, a specialist of the sacred
employing Afa divination, but his role in the family as its priest may recall
that of a dibia.
On his left arm is an image of the sun, perhaps suggesting the illumination of the sun in its physical value and its metaphoric implications:
The image of the sun evokes the goddess Anyanwu described thus by Chiamonwu Joy:
Anyanwu is the combination of two Igbo words - Anya-anwu ( the first word "Anya" means "eye" while the second word "anwu" means "sun"). Put together, it means "Eye of the Sun". Therefore, theologically, Anyanwu as the sun goddess, is also referred to as "the eye of the sun".
The Goddess Anyanwu is responsible for the gift of knowledge, insight, clear vision (foresight) and spiritual awakening. Symbolically, Anyanwu represents the sun and vice versa as every prayer and sacrifice offered to Anyanwu pays homage to the sun; because the sun in Igbo land represents light, good omen, good will and progress. Therefore, Anyanwu is light and she has powerful dominion over darkness. Anyone who makes sacrifices to her and [ is] favoured, is free from darkness, misfortune and bad omen.
The red cap on his head, an Igbo symbol of honour, amplified by the feather of a bird, perhaps an eagle, amplifies the grandeur of the male figure. The black staff he holds amplifies the sense of authority the figure embodies.
The woman's body is
patterned by symbols of a ram's horns, evoking the power of Amadioha, god of
justice and lightning. Also visible on her form are the Uli spiral of
regeneration, the hut representing home and the Nsibidi spiral of cognitive
development suggesting proceeding towards the integration of
understanding in a unifying centre.
These are the few of the symbolic body markings on the female figure I am able to venture to interpret, the nested triangles being images I am yet to encounter in my studies of Orji's symbol universe, just as I dont understand all the symbols on the man's body.
Orji's painting projects a truly archetypal couple. Their poise within the ordered luxuriance of a garden evokes and goes beyond the image of the earliest living space of humanity, represented by the primal couple in Christian mythology, the Garden of Eden, a garden transposed into the Igbo context through richly burnished gourds of palm wine, radiant in glorious brown.
The efflorescence of light to deep orange hues, the glow of black and radiance of green, the startling contrasts of colour which yet unite in one grand harmony, reverberate in terms of the projection of an idealized couple, the man embodying masculine strength, the woman feminine fecundity as suggested by her broad hips. They both project internalizations of strength, dignity, and wisdom, as suggested by the symbolism that configures their forms.
Abhinavagupta's salutations to his parents resonates powerfully with this grand image of a couple as dramatizing divine forces, the masculine/feminine dynamism enabling cosmic being and becoming.
The title of the central work discussed in this essay, Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, ''I Agree and my God Affirms'', is a perspective from indigenous Igbo thought unusual amidst the world's myriad cosmologies which are yet unified in affirming the existence of God, an ultimate identity responsible for the creation and sustenance of the universe.
Unlike the conventional understanding across most schools of thought, divine will is predominant, even though the human being is described as having a degree of independence of the divine.
This Igbo concept holds, however, that human will is dominant while divine will concurs with human will.
Strands of similar ideas can be found in Kalabari thought which holds that a stubborn deity may be shown the wood it was carved from and the power of a deity over its erstwhile devotees may be neutralised, as Nimi Wariboko has pointed out in the video ''Demons as Guests'' and in his book Ethics and Society in Nigeria.
Abosede Immanuel's Odun Ifa, Ifa Festival has a poem from indigenous Yoruba spirituality in which the devotee urges the deity to be satisfied with the dwelling provided for the spirit or go into the forest with a cutlass to fashion materials for its own preferred dwelling.
In Henry and Margaret Drewal's ''An Ifa Diviner's Shrine in Ijebuland'', Kolawole Ositola, priest of multiple deities in Yoruba cosmology, describes processes through which a collection of material forms becomes an abode for spirits, an active shrine, and how the spirits may depart, making the shrine nothing more than a material structure.
In various African systems, therefore, there exists a recognition of diverse kinds of human agency in relation to spirit, a framework within which the Igbo idea of the primacy of the human will belongs as one strand of the spectrum.
The Igbo expression, however, is balanced by another expression, which Chinua Achebe describes as demonstrating the fundamentality of duality in Igbo thought.
Achebe translates Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, as ''A Person Says 'Yes' and their Chi Says 'Yes' '' but, in relation to the tragedy of Okonkwo in his novel Things Fall Apart, an observer concludes that Okonkwo was a man who said ''yes'' and his chi said ''no'', a comment that may be linked to the Igbo folktale, told in the same book, of a great wrestler who defeated all opponents in the world of the living and that of spirits, but persisted in seeking more opponents in spite of being advised to withdraw in victory, upon which he was confronted by the last of the spirits, a thin creature who defeated him with little effort.
This spirit was his own chi, his own personal spirit, his own creator, a creative mandate exercised under the authority of Chi-Ukwu, the Great Chi, the superordinate creator , from which ''every chi branches'' as an individualised expression of the ultimate reality in all forms of being, the quoted words adapted from the Yoruba poem ''Ayajo Asuwada'' which develops the same idea of derivation from an ultimate source ( Akinsola Akiwowo, ''Towards a Sociology of Knowledge from an African Oral Poetry'').
While affirming human agency, therefore, the Igbo conception also recognises a tension between human and divine will. Achebe's novels Things Fall Apart and Arrow of God and his short story ''The Madman'' translate this tension into probing the question of the ultimate validity of ideas of spiritual influence in contrast to human agency.
The Calabash
Mysterious hands hold aloft, in reverential care, an exquisitely emblazoned calabash, radiant in subdued gold, the blaze of color magnified by contrast with the rhythmic lines of black running round its body, their delicate beauty rhyming with that of the tendrils rising from the tip of one finger each in the hands holding aloft the enigmatic beauty that is the calabash.
''Uwa'', according to the artist, means ''the world'' and ''ndu'' means ''life'', while ''chi'' is a spiritual guide which each living being-humans, animals and plants- have as understood in Igbo cosmology, she states.
The calabash is the primary symbolic form in this work. The evocative symmetry between the beauty of its patterning and the words inscribed on it as these resonate with the work's title constitute the semantic locus, the centre of meaning, of the piece. These values cascade in relation to the rest of the image through the symbolism of the tendrils, roots, as described by the artist, reaching from the calabash to pattern the artist's face.
Geographically distant but culturally convergent images may come to mind, stimulated by this transformation into a cosmological motif of an image of African rural domestic or general sacred activity-a woman carrying a calabash on her head in a domestic or ritual context.
On the calabash is boldly written ''CHI'', the Igbo conception of a divine essence of the self. Inside the first letter of the ''chi'' inscription is inscribed ''uwa'', ''world'' in Igbo. Ideas of convergence between individual divine essence and universal terrestrial and perhaps even cosmic scope are thereby evoked.
We are in the domain of similar visual images from other cultures that associate the centre of individual spiritual identity and cosmic divine presence in the human being with the top of the head, in particular, as with the sahasrara chakra of Hindu Yoga, and the head, in general, as the Yoruba ori concept, and Kether of the Jewish and Western esoteric Kabbalistic Tree of Life. The emanation of roots in Orji's image is particularly resonant with the tree motif of the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, itself a mapping of cosmic structure in terms of a tree related to the human form.
Orji's calabash becomes, therefore, a trigger for the unification of various cognitive systems, African, Western and Asian, an invitation to pursue one's own quest of ''mgborogwu'', ''roots'' as a cognitive motif, a search for foundational meaning both cultural and metaphysical, as described by Orji.
( ''The Igbo World and its Art'', Hopes and Impediments), an idea similar to the Yoruba ''ase'' ( Henry John Drewal et al, Yoruba: Nine Centuries; Rowland Abiodun, Yoruba Art and Language) the Chinese chi and the Indian Shakti.
They include the domestic, the calabash being a primary kitchen implement in those contexts. They involve the sacred and cultural, the calabash being also a central means of holding sacred implements in ritual contexts. Also strategic is the sacred and individualistic, the transposition of the calabash from those cultural contexts to its use in evoking the idea of an individualised divine essence and personal creator, chi. The most extensive is the cosmic, the employment of the chi calabash as an evocation of cosmic unity.
Scribal expressions-the word ''chi'' and its complementation by ''uwa'', ''world'', achieve evocative focus and amplification through the associative force of the structure of the calabash. Its circularity lends itself to ideas of unity of being and of eternity and infinity while its concavity resonates with ideas of depth of being.
This ideational totality suggests oscillation between individual and cosmic breadth and depth, ''the leaves scattered throughout the universe-existences, their individual natures and the relationships between them- perceived as one simple flame, the particular and universal ground into one by the fire of knowledge, a unity perceived as the calabash of totality as the moth vanishes into the candle flame, a fire that is uniquely itself yet one with the congregation of fires emanating from the primal blaze'', a collage of ideas from Italian poet Dante Alighieri (Divine Comedy), Zulu poet Mazisi Kunene ( Anthem of the Decades), Islamic poet Farid ud din Attar ( The Conference of the Birds) and myself, developing a mystical interpretation, a vision of an experience of cosmic unity inspired by the associative range of Orji's calabash image.
The choice of a calabash in representing chi goes beyond what I understand as conventional Igbo approaches to symbolizing that idea. It mobilizes imagery similar to the Igbo and Yoruba representation of the womb in terms of a pot, an image that resonates powerfully across various African symbol cultures ( Igbo Art Corpus: Women's Contributions"). Igbo and Yoruba pot symbolism are similar to the pan-African image of the calabash in suggesting fecundative and gestative depth, in relation to circular rhythm evoking eternity and cosmic unity.
The Metaphysical
The symbolism of the calabash ranges from the metaphysical and mythic to the epistemic. The metaphysical is represented by the calabash of the ''odu'' in ''Olodumare'', indicating the ''constellation of possibilities from which each moment is born'', as Shloma Rosenberg describes the Lukumi, Yoruba diaspora spirituality description of ''Olodumare'', the name of the creator of the universe as ''architect of continuous creativity'' ("Olorun, Mystic Curio).
The epistemic is demonstrated by the image of the calabash as evoking unity of contraries defining the cosmos. This is described, by Kunene, on Zulu epistemology, as realised through integrative understanding unifying the universal and the particular:
After creation, man was endowed with two minds: the precision mind and the cosmic mind. While the precision mind analyses and reorganizes the details of the material environment, the cosmic mind synthesizes fragments of information to create a universally significant body of knowledge.
At the highest point of reasoning, significant units of information merge with universal concepts pulled together by a unique form of intellectual power. [This enables a form of wisdom that ] sees all things in their balanced proportions and in their totality.
When the cosmic mind grinds its elements of experience into a totality of knowledge it acquires a discipline which by its "horrific'' power erases the boundaries between the past and the present, the living and the dead, the physical and non- physical. The individual initiate acquires, like a chameleon's all- round vision, the power to conceptualize the totality of life at once. Such wisdom is enshrined in the rounded calabash of symbolic cosmic power ( Anthem of the Decades).
What may be the contents of the calabash? How may they be discerned? How may such an embodiment of a person's ultimate potential as chi be engaged with? Ritual and prayer are foundational to engaging the belief in such realities in the Igbo and general African context. Going beyond those, Chinezeeks contributes this in response to an Instagram discussion of chi:
Chukwu is short for Chi Ukwu. Chi Ukwu means Big Chi or Big Energy aka God, Source, Universe. In Igbo cosmology. A key purpose of every individual is to align with their Chi. Because when an individual aligns with their Chi, they align with Chukwu.
…
How does one become more aligned with their Chi? by slowing down more - to breathe, to listen, to reflect. By giving more gratitude - for themselves, for others & everything. By taking more responsibility - for themselves, for others & everything .
Odinani priestess Amalu Chioma references a contemplative orientation to spiritual guidance from ancestors in a manner incidentally suited to the abstract character of chi understood as a guide:
[ Such guidance comes ] in quiet moments… when the mind is calm… when you are not forcing anything; sometimes it comes like a thought that feels different; sometimes it feels like a voice; sometimes it comes as a sudden knowing [ a communication] in ways many overlook —through nature, through stillness, through simple signs : that bird that caught your attention; that sudden breeze when you are deep in thought; that moment your mind becomes very clear; these things are not always ordinary. [These alignments result from] consistency, discipline, and quiet connection.’’ ( '' Listen STOP IGNORING THE ONES WALKING WITH YOU'', Facebook, March 25, 2026 )
The Mysticism of the Calabash and the Pot
These are unified in an Igbo name for the ultimate creator-Chineke, interpreted as ''God Who Creates'', adopting the explorations of Marcel Onyibor and Chinua Achebe for my own ends, in ways that differ slightly but significantly from their own more nuanced analysis of the Chineke concept ( Marcel I. S. Onyibor, ''The Role of Chi in Self-Actualization in Traditional Igbo Cosmology'', Nnamdi Azikiwe Journal of Philosophy 11. No. 1, 2019; Achebe, ''Chi in Igbo Cosmology'').
The solar images, on the calabash, Orji explains in interpreting the same image in her Amadioha painting, represent "Anyanwụ, good health, long life, a path filled with light and protection from darkness".
The hands are made mysterious by their color difference from the vitalistic hues of the artist's face face even as they blend with the black hair framing that face-hands black as midnight, clearly different in substance from the photographic realism of the artist's features and hair depicting the conventional tones of human biology.
Between Knowing and Unknowing
The character of those hands is suggested by the meaning of what they are holding, a calabash representing chi, the Igbo conception of the divine essence of the human being, embodiment of the self's ultimate potential, immortal and yet intimately engaged in the terrestrial course of a person's life.
Orji explains in the Facebook post where she presents this image that ''The hands symbolize the strength that comes from knowing one's roots and recognizing oneself.''
Godwin
Munonye Orji, responding to the post on its thread, adds further insight, describing it as ''a simple and interesting description of the invisible
thread that connects a human being on earth to his/ her spiritual home. This world, indeed, is not our home...''.
''Aye loja orun ni le'', ''the world is a marketplace, orun, [the zone of ultimate origins], is home', goes the correlative Yoruba expression. The cognate Igbo expression ''uwa bu aria'', ''the world is a market'', develops a similar structure of ideas, as evident from Nkeonye Otapkor's analysis of the Igbo expression ( ''The World is a Market-Place", The Journal of Value Inquiry 30: 521-530, 1996).
Further images shaping the symbol configurations of the hands, as interpreted by Orji in relation to other works of hers:
''Mkpụrụ/Ọmụmụ
These markings represent seeds and multiplication, the foundation of knowledge and the growth that comes from passing it down. To receive the wisdom of those who came before us, the old seeds must die to produce new ones. Without the experience and aging of our elders, we wouldn’t have the depth of knowledge we now possess.
New growth begins with a crack from the dead seed, feeding on what remains to survive. Our continuous effort to refine this knowledge is like watering the seeds, and passing it down allows it to spread and grow even stronger.''
A line of elegant white tendrils, roots, radiates from the chi calabash in a straight line onto a folded piece of white cloth on the artist's head. The artist describes the cloth as symbolizing ''one’s pure effort to stay connected to their Chi and roots''.
Roots, suggested by the white tendrils radiating onto the artist's face from the chi calabash, are part of Orji's signature symbol universe. In this instance, they may be understood as evoking the rootedness of the artist, and of human beings, in general, in chi.
The terrestrial self of the artist, her biological identity, is projected as emerging from chi. The full spectrum of her potential as a confluence of matter and spirit is thus evoked as the roots radiate to map the face of the figure of the image.
The roots constellate at particular points, such as between the eyes, and flower out under the eyes in elegant expansion. Ideas of enhanced vision enabled by the potencies of chi are thus evoked.
The roots culminate in a star formation at the artist's chin, suggesting the grounding of the architecture spirit and matter at a point representing the structural foundations of the face. The face thus becomes metonymic, representative of the self as a whole.
This symbolic character of the self may be better appreciated in relation to the cognate
Isese understanding of the the head,
represented by the face, as the symbol of the self as a unity of spirit and
matter. In this perspective, the face and the eyes in particular are indicative of the
relationship between levels of existence. The same word for ''eyes'', ''oju'' is used for the face. The image of the face is used for the character of a
phenomenon, concrete, abstract, or situational, particularly the aspect of it
that is immediately perceptible.
In using the motif of roots in anchoring the idea of a structural progression originating in the chi calabash and progressing to shape the face as a summation of the powers and nature of the self, the artist incidentally draws on the universal deployment of the image of plants, particularly trees, as cosmological symbols. This cosmological symbolism represents both the cosmos as a whole and the human being as a microcosm, a smaller form of the cosmos.
In such contexts, roots suggest the grounding of the cosmos and the human self in a nourishing centre, a divine ground enabling the existence of the cosmos and the self. The various aspects of the universe are depicted as the branches of this tree fed by the divine nutrients. The richest development of this idea are Yggdrasil, the Norse cosmic tree and the Judaic and Western esoteric Kabbalistic Tree of Life.
Such associations make Oriji's face in that self portrait a cosmological microcosm, a summation of the total network of possibilities enabled by the roots mapping the artist's face, representing the human face in general. The self's full range of possibilities as an embodied entity is suggested by the artist's shaping of the image of her own face.
These evocative conjunctions align this image with Orji's adaptation of the Western esoteric Hermetic maxim, ''As Above, So Below", evoking correspondence between the various aspects of existence. These correspondences are demonstrated particularly in the unity in difference of matter and spirit. This convergence of matter and spirit is suggested by the link between the material self of the figure in the image and the chi calabash.
A descent of power, moving with the devastatingly creative force of a bolt of lightning, penetrates the self, reconfiguring consciousness in terms of an awareness of its roots in a divine centre, is the idea suggested by this painting of Orji's constituting another variation on the relationship between the immortal, divine self, chi, and the mortal, embodied self, as is the image of the artist with a calabash on her head in Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, the painting of the baby connected to chi by a sinuous band of gold light, the woman receiving power from chi into a calabash.
''How may one
escape death, even the cycles of birth, death and rebirth, the spiral of
being and becoming that defines human existence in motion
between spirit and matter?'' Okechukwu's' question to Death, as Nachiketas'
story in the Indian Upanishads may be adapted in terms of
Orji's own interpretation of the Uli spiral, a central motif of her work
between metaphysics-the structure and dynamism of the universe- and
epistemology-awareness of these cosmological dynamics.
''Through sensitivity to Eke, recreation'', Death responds, as the
discourse may be further imagined, this time wholly adapting Orji's own insights on the Uli symbol of the spiral and another
context on the Nsibidi interpretation of the same motif.
''Becoming as the the snail shell, coiled yet protective, representing
spiritual refuge and the inward journey of the soul toward wisdom, folding
within and unfolding outwards under the impetus of the sun of inspiration as
you walk the Earth under the solar luminary, journeying from time into
eternity'', Death summed up.
''Cultivating the
eternal dialogue between the seen and unseen, drawing experience from both
the physical state and from beyond the body'' Death continued, ''you become as
the royal python, Eke, coiling and uncoiling as power incubates and expands,
transforming experience into knowledge, going beyond what one has merely
seen with one's eyes or thought in the mind, to what one has lived
through, understood, and perceived as a spirit being existing in a physical
body, leading to the understanding that existence is one, as we move between
our ultimate home and our transient home on Earth.
The plant, small yet indestructible, proceeds like Ulili, the small
forest rodent, perpetually mobile yet often pausing re-examine his trail, and
like Udene, the eagle, soaring high above the landscape of being and becoming,
like Ogilisi, the creeping plant which spreads out covering a large area,
facilitating its capture of sunlight, even as its main root is difficult to
locate for it has many, enabling it grow in several directions at once, making it symbolic for Agwu’s ability to penetrate the visible and invisible
worlds in his search for knowledge, travelling to distant lands to gather
information about the unknown, knowledge placed at the service of the dibia, the
Afa specialist of the sacred consecrated to Agwu, the central
cognitive guide of Afa.
knowledge, meditation, practice
study, concentration, penetration
understand that everything comes from Spirit, that Spirit alone is sought and found;
attain everlasting peace
mount beyond birth and death.
When a person understands themself,
understands universal Self,
the union of the two kindles the triple Fire, offers the sacrifice; then shall they, though still on earth, break the bonds of death, beyond sorrow, mount into heaven
The concluding poetic lines are a slightly reworked version from the Upanishidic narrative which Orji's painting of lightning like illumination takes my mind to, the lines seemingly in motion on the figure's body suggesting the integration of the self in the generation of a glorious rebirthing, ''ba bini ko to ka tura eni be'' ''to be born is not as important as giving birth to yourself anew'' (Yoruba) "The tiny lines you can see swimming on the 'figure] represents the coming together of different forces to achieve something great 'IGWE BU IKE' '' (Orji).
Igbo Spirituality as Aesthetic Philosophy
In describing her painting Mgbọrọgwụ, which in English means Roots, Orji explains her use of roots as a cosmological motif in a manner that is relevant to the work, Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe,
being discussed here:
In this work, I express
what it feels like to be in a constant search for knowledge about my roots and
where I come from, the ones who came before me and how they lived. I take what
resonates with my mmụọ and let go of what does not.
I learned about the term "root pruning," which involves cutting some
roots, often to prepare a tree or shrub for transplanting. Root pruning is also
done to encourage the growth of new, healthy roots, to guide their path, and to
help them absorb more minerals from the soil.
In my search for knowledge, I
remain mindful that those who came before me were human, they made mistakes,
some of which have hindered and continue to hinder many of us from growing and
fully absorbing the goodness of our heritage. So, I cut off these roots because
they do not sit well with me, thereby giving myself the space to be healthy and
to develop purely as a spiritual being.
Applying this concept to our daily acceptance of evolution can greatly assist
us on our journey, helping us control which aspects of evolution we embrace and
which ones we reject.
In this art piece, the roots move like fluid, sheltering different patterns,
this represents the preservation of one’s heritage. The feminine figure
symbolizes the nurturing ability one must have to truly accept oneself (our
roots) for what it is while tending to it, watering and feeding it to grow and
flourish. The roots weaving in and out of the female figure represent
self-acceptance, an acknowledgement of where one comes from and where one is
headed. They also embody the saying "As above, so below."
"As above, so below" means that the patterns of the universe are
reflected in all aspects of life, from the vast cosmos to the smallest details
on Earth. It suggests that the spiritual and physical worlds are
interconnected, and what happens in one realm influences the other. This idea
is often used to explain harmony, balance, and the principle that understanding
the small can reveal the nature of the great.
She further elaborates on the symbolism of roots in
relation to her Amadioha painting: ''The lines spreading or
shooting out into the background represent roots and lightning. This is a
representation of spiritual protection, energy, power. These are the guidelines
passed down to us by ndị ichie, roots that must be watered and a light to show
generations to come.''
Roots, she continues, may also represent ''Strong will, Ambitions,
Goals, Energy, Knowledge that was passed down to us, Foresight, Ihe / Light,
Healthy roots, Greatness''.
A rich expression of mbgorogwu thereby emerges, the
dynamism of roots, their mobility in seeking and transmitting nourishment from
the soil to their tree evoking cognitive dynamism in the quest for meaning
within one's native culture. Roots spreading from their point of origin to
intersect with others in constituting an ecological network may also suggest a
forest of possibilities, an intercultural network.
A quest of selection and adaptation is thereby evoked, in which tradition is modernised through critical appropriation, akin to Olabiyi Yai and Rowland Abiodun's description of the concept of ''asa'', the balance between tradition and creativity in Yoruba art ( Yai, ''In Praise of Metonymy: The Concepts of 'Tradition' and 'Creativity' in the Transmission of Yoruba Artistry over Time and Space''; Abiodun, Yoruba Art and Language).
''...the aesthetic matrix is the fount of my own creative inspiration; it
influences my critical response to the creation of other cultures and validates
selective eclecticism as the right of every productive being, scientist or
artist'' states Wole Soyinka of his intra and extra cultural explorations from
within his native Yoruba culture ( Art, Dialogue and Outrage: Essays on
Literature and Culture, ed. Biodun Jeyifo, 1988, 329).
Orji
adapts the Western esoteric Hermetic maxim, ''As Above, So Below", evoking
correspondence between the various aspects of existence. These correspondences
are demonstrated particularly in the unity in difference of matter and spirit.
This convergence of matter and spirit is suggested by the link between the
material self of the figure in the image and the chi calabash.
Orji therefore approaches Igbo spirituality as a process of selection and recreation. She treats tradition as a flowing river, ever ancient and ever new, incidentally aligning with Yoruba discourse on history as a river, with Chinua Achebe on creative refashioning in Igbo thought represented by the idea of life as an opportunity to experience every engagement with reality as ''morning yet on creation day'' in his essay ''Chi in Igbo Cosmology''.This is correlative with Olabiyi Yai's idea of the Yoruba equivalent of chi, ''ori'' as centred in dynamism.
Google AI's summation of Yai's essay is incidentally instructive for appreciating Orji's correlative artistic and philosophical achievement:
Yáì's Theory of Metonymy
Yáì explored this concept in his foundational 1993 essay, "In Praise of Metonymy: The Concepts of 'Tradition' and 'Creativity' in the Transmission of Yoruba Artistry over Time and Space". He argued that standard Western art history and literary criticism are bound by "metaphor" (comparison) and rigid classifications, which often fail to capture the reality of Yoruba culture.
Instead, Yáì proposed that Yoruba artistic and cultural systems are fundamentally metonymic. His approach includes the following key ideas:
· Tradition as Metonymy: In Yoruba cosmology, culture (àṣà) is a continuous, open-ended process of creation rather than a static historical artifact. Traditions are "metonymic selections"—creative bits and fragments selected from diverse, dispersed histories and reassembled to form living, breathing wholes.
· The Transience of Art: The ideal Yoruba artist is an itinerant (an àrè) who engages with reality by departing from it. This means every piece of art or cultural creation is a stand-in for a broader, ongoing system of meanings and relationships.
· Oríkì and Ìtàn: Yáì urged scholars to abandon viewing African history and art through a purely European, textual lens. He suggested that recognizing the metonymic nature of discourse—where everything is connected to oral traditions (oríkì or praise-poetry) and history (ìtàn)—helps us understand how Yoruba artistry retains its vitality, mobility, and capacity for endless innovation.
The Forehead, the Eyes and Anyanwu
Anyanwu is the combination of two Igbo words - Anya-anwu ( the first word "Anya" means "eye" while the second word "anwu" means "sun"). Put together, it means "Eye of the Sun". Therefore, theologically, Anyanwu as the sun goddess, is also referred to as "the eye of the sun".
The Goddess Anyanwu is responsible for the gift of knowledge, insight, clear vision (foresight) and spiritual awakening. Symbolically, Anyanwu represents the sun and vice versa as every prayer and sacrifices offered to Anyanwu pays homage to the sun; because the sun in Igbo land is representation of light, good omen, good will and progress. Therefore, Anyanwu is light and she has powerful dominion over darkness. Anyone who makes sacrifices to her and [ is] favoured, is free from darkness, misfortune and bad omen.
Orji's explanation of her use of the symbolism of the eye in another work, Ochendo, clarifies this body of ideas:
Amamihe na Ahumahu
The eyes (whether one eye or three) represent knowledge and experience drawn from both the physical state and experiences beyond the body.
When Igbo people say “Ahula m ọtutu ihe na ndu a,” they are not speaking of what they have merely seen with their eyes, but of what they have lived through, understood, and perceived as spirit beings existing in a physical body.
These experiences cultivate the ability to understand what is invisible to others.
''what I saw''
This stark colour contrast, in harmony with the incongruous and yet majestic image of a universe of forms constituted by the hand, imbues the work with a sense of mystery, of the magical and elemental, the colour contrasts evoking the primordial, the fundamental formations of the universe before its emergence into the multitudinous and yet bewilderingly ordered constellation in terms of which the artist sees her own arm.
A Symbol Constellation
What are Orji's views on this imagistic cosmos, on its evocative potential?:
''Ulo
Here, the hut symbolizes our origin, the place we come from. It represents the essence of home, a presence we carry within us even in foreign lands. It explains why our accents differ, why our beliefs and way of life stand apart, a reflection of where our roots first touched the earth.''
''Eke
The spiral embodies the rhythm of existence, a sacred symbol of continuity, ogwugwu, regeneration, reincarnation, cosmic balance, and the eternal dialogue between the seen and unseen.
Found in Uli art and natural forms like the snail shell and the python (Eke), it mirrors the cycle of life, death, and rebirth.
The snail shell, coiled yet protective, represents spiritual refuge and the inward journey of the soul toward wisdom.
The python, sacred to the feminine principle, coils and uncoils with divine grace, symbolizing hidden power, fertility, and ancestral energy.
Together, they express the Igbo understanding that all life moves in circles, expanding, contracting, and regenerating in harmony with the cosmic order. The spiral teaches that nothing ends, everything transforms.''
The narrow, cylindrical geometric form represents the yam, regarded as the leader of crops in the Igbo community. It symbolizes abundance, harvest, fertile land, prosperity, problem-solving, and good living.''
''Igwe bu ike
In essence, the entire composition embodies the principle of atomism, the idea that every whole is born from the gathering of many smaller parts. Each element, like a particle, finds meaning through connection, forming a greater harmony. According to Igbo philosophy.
“Otu osisi adighi eme oké ohia” — one tree does not make a forest
“Igwe bu ike” — true strength lies in unity / multitude is strength.''May the volatility at times associated with Agwu not be described as a way of describing the volatility that may be associated with creativity as well as its dynamism?
The Nose
Proceeding beyond the eyes, the white line of roots continues to the artist's nose.The nose, like the eyes with the sense of sight, is the primary human instrument of one of the senses, the sense of smell. I expect smell may also be perceived in Odinani as enabling a spectrum of perceptions, from the physical to the spiritual.
''In Igbo thought, speech is not merely a tool for communication but a potent spiritual force with the capacity to create, destroy, bind, or liberate. It is considered a 'shrine' or a direct conduit of ancestral power, heavily implicated in the crafting of personal destiny and the maintenance of cosmic balance '' ( Google AI:Chukwu; Chike; Khajuria, Ikegbo)
I live Igbo spirituality. I'm immersed in it.
I am privileged to be raised by a father who, though he was a Catholic, practiced Igbo spirituality. He was an ozo title holder.
I witnessed his ozo title taking. There's a ceremony about washing his tongue. He could never tell lies, especially in a meeting of umunna. Meeting of kinsmen.
So for land disputes, and sundry cases, the community relied on the testimonies of the elders, especially those who have taken ozo title, because of the tongue washing ritual.
''In the beginning, God said 'let there be light' '' is the Judaic rendering of the ultimate expression of the human celebration of the power of speech, which is often extended to the human being, seeing as sharing in God's powers. Similar ideas are developed in Hinduism. Mantric systems, systems of sacred sound, are constructed in amplifying the idea that the universe came into being through sacred sound and is sustained in existence through that sound, rendered as OM, which a person may chant to facilitate alignment with that cosmic essence.
The Chin
The line from the chi calabash culminates in a star formation on the artist's chin, the structural foundation of the face, the lower foundation of facial architecture.
The Crescent Moon Necklace
At Orji's throat is a crescent moon pendant, a symbol of Ala, the earth goddess. According to Bright Donatus, the moon in Igbo thought evokes rhythms of life represented by birth, growth, death and renewal. He further describes it as suggesting feminine fertility through its connection with female menstrual rhythms and agricultural cycles. It is perceived, he states, as a messenger of the gods, a pure and sacred presence enabling certain spirits or deities become more active during full moons, the moon at all times perceived as watching ''over the earth at night'' [inspiring] spiritual reflection, storytelling, rituals and honoring the ancestors''.
Sloane Angelou outlines an entire cycle of spiritual activity based on the Igbo conception of the phases of the moon ( ''Who is ‘Oma’ in Igbo Cosmology?''; ''Ògụ́àfọ̀ Ị̀gbò: The 13 Moons In Igbo Cosmology & Their Significance In Odinani'' ( ⊙ma’s Garden: Odinani, the Spirituality, Science and Lifestyle of Igbo People)
The range of associations of lunar spirituality runs from Hinduism to modern Western nature spirituality, convergences deepening its contribution to humanity's interpretation of the material cosmos in terms of ultimate values.
The intercontinental allure of the moon in relation to natural/terrestrial, cosmic and human creativity, particularly in relation to the human feminine, is suggested by its role in Western origin Neo-Paganism, particularly in its development of witchcraft as a religion, in defiance of the pre-modern persecution of women in Western history, leading to two iconic books studying this development-Margot Alder's Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America Today, adapting the name of a ritual in modern Western witchcraft and Ronald Hutton's The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft.
A particularly powerful evocation of moon centred ideas of creative change imaged in terms of the feminine emerges from Hinduism, in the opening salutation of a commentary by Bhsraskya to Vasugupta's The Shiva Sutras: "May (all) prostrate before the Lord, the bestower of boons Who is the beloved of the daughter of the Snowy Mountains that bears as a crestjewel the budding moon and sustains, destroys and creates (all things).''
Mark Dyzkowki's explanation of this moon symbolism is particularly powerful in depicting it in a manner that resonates in ideational force far beyond its Hindu context, incidentally subsuming a range of moon symbolism, from Odinani to Western Neo-Paganism-
The movement of the moon is thought to continuously regenerate the universe. The moon is the visible form of the divine source of the lifegiving ambrosia (soma, amrta) which, as it gradually wains, empties out of it to feed the entire universe of objectivity, including the gods and manes, as well as the sun and the other cosmic bodies along with man's body, senses and mind.
During the bright fortnight, as the moon waxes, it gradually reabsorbs into itself from its hidden source what it had lost in the dark fortnight.
In this way, the moon, which consists of fifteen digits, (kala) increases and decreases continuously. This cyclic process of nourishment and self-regeneration is grounded in an unchanging, underlying reality that persists as the permanent element that guarantees the continuity and regularity of this process.
This element is conceived to be the sixteenth digit of the moon, known as amakala. Although invisible, it is the source of all the other digits and hence the one which ultimately nourishes the whole universe (visvatarpini), and so is identified with the divine energy of the emission (visarga) of consciousness that incessantly renews all things.
"Ọdịnala", Orji states, ''is the complete Igbo worldview, grounded in an understanding of the land and nature, and in principles that guide people to live in harmony with their environment, including the beliefs and values that shape life and maintain order'', an eco-cosmological consciousness she expresses through the artistic piece below:
Synergy of Igbo, Yoruba and Other Indigenous African Spiritualities and Others Across the World through Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe
In appreciating the symbolism of Orji's Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe , understanding Igbo thought and art, from the chi concept to Uli and Nsibidi visual art, is indispensable.
Orji's own individualistic interpretations of this symbolism and of her own self created symbols gives a sharper edge and more profound imaginative range to this visual network.
An even better appreciation of this powerful visual structure is gained by correlating its symbolism with other indigenous African symbol systems, particularly that of the Yoruba, to which Igbo artistic and spiritual symbolism is particularly close, while those of other peoples within Nigeria, such as the Urhobo and the Kalabari, also constitute complementary variants.
Beyond the closest cultural similarities represented by African systems of thought, related similarities amidst differences also exist across the world, from Asia to Europe to the Americas and more.
These conjunctions demonstrate humanity as a single organism or intelligence, seeking answers to similar or identical questions across the globe and developing related responses to those questions.
This unity of humanity is dramatized through the associative force of Orji's Onye Kwe, Chi Ya Ekwe, an Igbo woman in Enugu, Nigeria, whose art fires a sound travelling across the world, circling the planet, and even launching into space, as the issues the art projects reverberate in the cosmic puzzles of human existence.
Walking and walking, we reached the shores
of a great river.
''Everyone must cross this river in their own way, a way they must discover by
themself'' my guide stated and remained standing, her immobility provoking the
question of how I was to commence discovering how to cross the river.
Looking round me I became aware of the deep silence of the place.
As I gazed at the river in that fateful place, the only sounds were from the movement of the monkeys in the forest, sounds swallowed by the awesome silence.
The silence was terrible.
Sublime.
Almost frightening.
A silence so intense, so deep, it began to assume a personality.
Slowly, it condensed into an identity, a
personage I sensed rather than saw.
The presence gradually assumed form as the silence deepened, my
nerves stretched to breaking point as I found myself inside this irruption of
the uncanny, a space revealing its living essence through absence of sound.
Then, it fully arrived.
''Who are you?" I asked.
The reply, spoken without words but understood by me nevertheless, was “I
speak only in symbols and am spoken with only in symbols''.
I said to him, "You beautiful bearer of good tidings, this is a great good. Do teach me your vocabularies and instruct me in the hows of turning your opening keys, because I want to be your companion in conversations and I love your possibilities.''
He made a secret gesture, and I knew.
Then he shone to me a truth of his beauty and I was overwhelmed with passion. I was felled before him and the moment overcame me.
When I recovered again after fainting, trembling from fear, he knew that knowledge of him had arrived, and he set down his walking stick and sat.
The ones who fear God, of His creatures, are the ones who know; so he took reverent fear as a proof that I had gotten knowledge and he deemed the reverent fear to be a way to recognize that knowledge had arrived to me.
I said to him, ''Show me some of your mysteries, so that I would be one to transcribe your beauties.''
He said, ''Observe the sectioned segments of my cobble-stoned whole and the ordered arrangement of my shape and you will find what you are asking of me to be imprinted throughout me, for I am neither a mukallim, who speaks for himself nor a kalīm, who speaks for another and my knowledge is not anything but me. I am knowledge, the known, and the one who knows. I am the ḥikma (wisdom), the muḥkam (the fount of wisdom secured from ambiguity), and the ḥakīm (who decides wisely).''
I hereby share with you, brethren, what I understood on that fateful day in the great silence by the river:
