Reviving Uli - A Dying Body Art Among Igbo Women.

Women decorating Iyiazi Shrine, Agukwu Nri, Nigeria 

Uli is an ancient body art style that represents history and rich, complicated storytelling. In this piece, Rejoice Anodo considers its cultural decline and what needs to be done to revive it.

Growing up Igbo in Nigeria, in a conservative Christian household, there was never talk about body art. The few sightings I had of tattoos were on people I was strictly warned to avoid, as they were considered couriers of bad habits. My first encounter with body art aside from tattoos was of Indian women in movies with beautiful elaborate designs on their hands and feet. At first, I thought they were permanent, but later on, I learnt that they were temporary and would fade with time.

Several years passed, and my interest in body adornment practices in Nigeria was re-ignited by some cultural shows I watched. I read more about body patterning practices in Nigeria and came across henna, worn mostly in the northern part of Nigeria by Muslim women, ila worn by Yoruba men and women, and Uli worn by women in the South-Eastern part of Nigeria.

While I had seen a few people in person with henna designs and ila facial marks, I had never encountered someone with uli body art. Further research confirmed my suspicions: Uli was dying out.

A species of Uli (Uli Mkpuru)

A notable resource which confirmed my judgment was The Endangered Material Knowledge Programme (EMKP), and their research project, Speaking Bodies: Documenting Uli Body Designs of the Igbo of Nigeria, published in 2021. They observed the Effium people of Ebonyi State as they carried out preparations for the Jioha festival: a rite of passage ceremony for young men and betrothed girls. Part of this preparation included uli design sessions for all the celebrants who would display them in a public procession afterwards. An excerpt from the project stated that “Uli in its indigenous form is facing the risk of extinction as many have abandoned the traditional body design for modern makeup”.  

 Body patterning was a common cosmetic practice in South-Eastern Nigeria. It served decorative and spiritual purposes, carried out on both sexes. These body patterning rites were done according to body types and titles held within the community. There are several body patterning techniques in Igbo land. 

Red camwood (ufie), white chalk (nzu) and yellow camwood are the primary components used for body decoration. They are usually acquired as powder and made into paste for adequate use, and then applied onto the body surface. Nzu has prominent spiritual significance and ufie has purported healing properties. Camwood also serves as the base for uli designs. It is spread thinly over the body area before Uli  patterns are drawn.

A young girl being decorated with Uli for a festive occasion

Uli, also known as uri, is a cosmetic body art with origins from Igbo land, done by women as a form of personal decoration. The art seeks to complement the unique features of women as Uli painters focus on amplifying their good looks. 

Igbo Arts Community and Cosmos aptly describes Uli as “the women’s art par excellence and is closely related to wall painting. Uli is painted with a clear brownish liquid (made from the crushed seeds of several plant species) that turns dark blue when it has been on the skin for several minutes. Normally it is applied with a thin sliver of wood or uli knife (mma nwuli) that enables the artist to create fine, delicate lines”. 

Women of all ages, young, married and aged had Uli applied on their bodies in preparation for festivals, wedding celebrations and title-taking ceremonies.

These designs were made in accordance to the event at hand; simple designs for an everyday look, complex detailed motifs for celebrations, especially for the celebrants, such as a young bride. 

During iru mgbede, the fattening period of a young bride-to-be, uli is also added to the retinue of cosmetic treatments used on her. Although it was primarily women-centric, men also had their haircuts designed in semblance with Uli inspired motifs. Their hair would be cut low and then morphed into shapes, their hair representing the motifs and clean-cut skin representing ohere, blank-space.

Following the documented reports of colonial anthropologists such as Northcote Thomas sequestered in the South-Eastern part of Nigeria during the early 1900s, it is clear that there were diverse beauty standards that followed the pattern of body patterning, Uli being one of the most practised. It was not a sacred art. Women adorned the bodies of other women, old and young, with curvilinear patterns, free motifs and free-hand designs. These artists were well mastered in the craft, and designed their subjects in accordance to their body structures, enhancing their inherent beauty. 

While the body art held little or no spiritual significance at all, painting murals on shrines was a different matter. They were spiritual, and were done by specially chosen women, artists who were given the privilege to be privy of masquerades and their secrets. One of the titles conferred on such women is nne mmanwu, which loosely translates to mother of masquerades.  

Painting these motifs on mud fences and houses was done by women in groups. The walls were sectioned to allow each woman to create designs of her own, showcasing ingenuity and leaving her personal mark. It was also a way of community building, as younger women learned the skill from watching and helping out.

During the early stages of colonization, when white traders and civil servants were regarded as curious visitors, Uli was still in popular demand. Uli artists even learnt to incorporate laundry detergent to make a blue pigment, different from the red, yellow, white and black pigments already in existence. With the influence of Christian missionaries and their ardent teachings, the wearing of Uli declined.

Colonization brought Christianity, corporate jobs and whiskey and guns, in the same vein it also brought a different clothing style and accompanying beauty standards. The latter did not provide a space for Uli to exist, and with time, it faded. People wore more clothing, less elaborate hairstyles and even less body patterns. They were associated with the old and ‘stubborn’, people who refused to convert to Christianity and its ethics.

Uli liquid

While this persisted, there have been continuous external efforts to prevent uli’s demise.

Uli: art and archive owned by [Re:]Entanglements is a project focused on the revisitation of N. W. Thomas’s ethnographic archive. His work focused on South East Nigeria and Sierra Leone during colonial times. Their website houses stock photos and first-hand information on uli collected by Northcote W. Thomas during his time spent in Igbo land. They have been a valuable resource for research on beauty rites in pre-colonial Igbo history. Research associates from this project have participated in programs like The Igbo Conference to revive conversations about uli.

The Nsukka Group is made up of seven artists who are famous for incorporating Uli in modern art forms. The Poetics of Line: Seven Artists of the Nsukka Group was launched as an exhibition at the National Museum of African Art of the Smithsonian Institution to showcase their work in 1970. Eziafo Okaro was an indigenous Uli classicist whose works garnered considerable attention. Her work caught the eye of the former US ambassador to Nigeria, Dr Robin Sanders, who was also conducting research for her book. Later, the ambassador and the late Peter Areh commissioned her works on other art media and placed them in international galleries for public exhibition. 

In 2013, Dr. Robin Sanders published her book, The Legendary Uli Women of Nigeria: Their Life Stories in Signs, Symbols and Motifs, based on the lives of Eziafo and seven other women, all Uli classicists and the work they did together. Eziafo Okaro died in 2014, leaving behind a huge gap in the body patterning industry.

These works inspired new generation artists to include traditional symbols in their work as body artists. One such artist is Emmanuel Uchenna Item, a Nigerian-Austrian tattoo artist who incorporates West African body patterning into his work. His work stands out because he encourages his clients to get body art synonymous with their roots, and this way, many Nigerians who visit him mostly get Uli and Nsibidi-inspired designs. 

Going through his Instagram page does something to the mind. The tattoos are similar, in the sense that they are tattoos, but they represent a certain range of acceptance. The bearers know what they want, and they’ve got it permanently with the understanding of its cultural significance.

Emmanuel Item, a Nigerian tattoo artist based in Vienna

 It makes me a bit jealous. I’d like to get something like this, I say to myself when he uploads a new post displaying newly inked hands and feet. During this mental gymnastics, I know deep down that if I were to have a session with the artist, I’d politely decline, not out of fear of needles or the permanence of ink on skin, but of something else. I have not completely gotten over my perception of tattoos, what they might mean when I wear them, and what my family would think of me. 

While the new-age art adaptations do not represent Uli in its original form, they ought to be applauded for their efforts at its restoration.

If we do not make efforts to remind people about Uli and its place as an essential cosmetic pillar in Igbo culture, it will die out. 

Since the introduction of Christianity and the subsequent spread of Pentecostalism, Nigeria has witnessed one of the highest Christian conversion rates. Eager to spread the gospel, traditional artifacts are destroyed without care, being regarded as the devil’s assets. 

Uli painting by Eziafo Okaro, Ogidi, Nigeria

Contrary to popular opinion, Uli is not a fetish. While it is true that uli-inspired motifs are drawn on shrine walls as mural paintings, it is not demonic either. Wearing a dress with Uli-inspired motifs does not mean the wearer is revering an ancient spirit. Getting uli drawings on your body will not revive a dead ancestor, nor will it attract evil spirits. If we can reduce the fanaticism associated with avoiding fetish objects, the world will be a better place.

I understand the need to shield oneself from the unknown. It is very Nigerian to consider the spiritual significance and consequent implications before getting involved in anything. This was a major factor that drove the silence in my household, and I believe it may apply in similar cases. I still do this, so it is nothing to be ashamed of.

Prior to my conversance with Uli and other body patterns, I had always avoided being associated with people who bore them. Overcoming the misconceptions I was raised with required a healthy dose of open-mindedness—which I’d gladly recommend to everyone. I might be a bit hesitant to get tattoos of any sort, but I do not perceive them as evil anymore. Uli was a clear beauty standard and cosmetic art. It still is. Its racing decline requires unprecedented effort to maintain the current state of its knowledge and create more awareness.