By Henry Chigozie Duru
Uli body design is one notable cultural heritage of the Igbo people of Southeast Nigeria. It involves use of liquid juices extracted from the pods or fruits of Uli tree to make some beautifying marks on the body by way of motifs and patterns. Unfortunately, this heritage, like many others, is facing threat of extinction as a result of the encroachment of modernity.
To preserve this cherished culture of one of the largest ethnic groups in Nigeria, a team of researchers led by Tracie Utoh-Ezeajugh, a professor of theatre and film design at Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, has been working to document this practice in its original form. The project, titled “Speaking Bodies: Documenting Uli Body Designs of the Igbo of Nigeria,” is funded by the British Museum through its Endangered Material Knowledge Programme (EMKP) and with support from the Arcadia Fund. Other members of the team include Dr. Onyekachukwu Ebekue, Dr. Ngozi Emeka-Nwobia and Akpa Peter Emenike.
The researchers are focusing on the Joha rite-of-passage ceremony of Effium community in Ebonyi State, which is one of the very few ceremonies/performances where the Uli body design art can still be found in its original indigenous form. This informed the decision of the research team to take advantage of this ceremony where Uli artists display their craft through use of the free-hand style to draw Uli motifs and patterns with natural Uli dye and local instruments. This is as against the improvised approaches that have become common today including in the Nollywood epic film set.
The leader of the research team, Prof. Utoh-Ezeajugh, noted that her team’s effort to document the Uli body art in its pristine form was informed by the fact that this art is facing a real risk of extinction. “Its documentation will help preserve it not just for purpose of memory and history but also to provide reference materials that will serve as a guide for anyone interested in replicating this indigenous art. Such persons will include Nollywood filmmakers and other theatre artists. If you observe, this art is fast disappearing and even where it is still found, it hardly retains its original form in terms of method, instruments used, and the final product,” She stated.
This project, which was initiated in 2021, experienced some delay when the Effium community (chosen for the research) was embroiled in a communal conflict that forced members to flee their residents for other communities in search of safety, meaning that the Joha rite-of-passage ceremony could not be held. To surmount this challenge, the research team, with cooperation of the community, arranged for the ceremony to be held in another community in what the team termed “performance-in-exile.” Its intention was to stage the rendition of the Uli body art in a makeshift location yet without compromising its originality.
Speaking on the specific goals of the project, Prof. Utoh-Ezeajugh, said “We initiated the project as a way of documenting the Uli art in video and still-photograph formats to help preserve – as a tangible system of material knowledge and cultural heritage – the indigenous skills, materials and motifs/patterns associated with Uli. The goal is to achieve this documentation before this indigenous artform possibly goes into extinction. It is equally hoped that a documentation like this will encourage a synergy between traditional and modern Uli designers.
“Secondly, we were also motivated by the need to ignite research interest in Uli and other traditional body designs and encourage the universal distribution of indigenous artistic knowledge and as well place Uli plants in the sphere of ecological knowledge systems especially as ongoing deforestation makes it increasingly difficult to find the plants.”
The research team will submit its report which includes a video and photo documentation of the Uli traditional art to the Endangered Material Knowledge Programme (EMKP) of the British Museum EMKP for deposition in its repository while the documentation will also be deposited locally.
