Stylogeny combining Afrofuturist Design × Uli

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Style combination · Pairs well

Afrofuturist Design × Uli

Afrofuturism already borrows nsibidi, as in Black Panther's Ancient Wakandan script; keep uli's sparse dark line and real, public signs rather than glowing pseudo-glyphs on deep-space grounds.

From the research on Uli & Nsibidi Line and Sign Tradition

Mix them and make something Afrofuturist Design Uli

LightAfrofuturist Design × Uli1970 · 1900
A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Uli, their arrangement from Uli, the finish from Afrofuturist Design. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

01

What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

Afrofuturist Design Uli & Nsibidi Line and Sign Tradition

Type from Afrofuturist Design
Colour from Afrofuturist Design
Form from Uli
Composition from Uli
Surface from Afrofuturist Design

02

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · Afrofuturist Design

Light

Ojuju, standing in for Wakandan script (Nsibidi-derived, Black Panther, 2018)

Text · Uli

Two linked graphic languages of southeastern Nigeria. Uli is Igbo women's body and wall painting: freehand lines that swell and taper, spirals and small named motifs set asymmetrically on open ground, so gaps count as much as marks. Nsibidi comprises hundreds of pictographic and abstract signs from the Cross River region, kept chiefly by the Ekpe and Mgbe leopard societies and reserved white on indigo ukara cloth. In 1962 Uche Okeke took uli into modern ink drawing; at Nsukka from the 1970s younger artists, Obiora Udechukwu above all, carried uli and later nsibidi into drawing and painting.

Instrument Sans; Uli used Nsibidi signs as an ideographic set, drawn by hand and Uli line and motif repertoire drawn freehand

03

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Afrofuturist Design, with a counter-accent from Uli. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Afrofuturist Design Uli & Nsibidi Line and Sign Tradition

  • #0b0a1a ground · 36%
  • #d4a017 ink · 14%
  • #c2185b accent · 18%
  • #8c3a23 accent · 14%
  • #00a6a6 accent · 10%
  • #23305a accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #0b0a1a;
  --ink: #d4a017;
  --accent-1: #c2185b;
  --accent-2: #8c3a23;
  --accent-3: #00a6a6;
  --accent-4: #23305a;
  --font-display: "Ojuju", sans-serif;
  --font-text: "Instrument Sans", sans-serif;
}

Use it with care

Afrofuturist Design: Afrofuturism is a self-authored vision of Black futures that draws on meaning-bearing symbols (Adinkra, Nsibidi, Kemetic and textile motifs) tied to specific peoples. Use glyphs for what they mean rather than as generic 'tribal' texture, and commission, credit or collaborate with Black and African designers.

Uli & Nsibidi Line and Sign Tradition: These are living traditions with restricted parts. Nsibidi has a sacred side kept by the Ekpe and Mgbe leopard societies, and ukara cloth is used exclusively by Ekpe members, so never copy society signs or ukara layouts for decoration, merchandise or invented 'secret' meanings; use only signs whose public meaning has been checked with knowledgeable members of the community. Uli is Igbo women's art, which declined after Christian missionaries discouraged it, and the mostly male Nsukka artists were criticised for drawing on it; credit and commission Igbo and Cross River artists, including women painters such as those of the Upa Women Artists Collective, and do not present invented pseudo-nsibidi or generated 'uli' as historical work. Keep the two traditions apart in credit: uli is Igbo women's painting, nsibidi a sign system of Ejagham origin kept by Ekpe and Mgbe men's societies; never label one as the other.

04

The two styles

A woman with a star-filled afro, elaborate gold jewelry and purple-and-turquoise robes raises her open hands beneath the gold title “SOLARA.” Planets, flying saucers, celestial symbols and futuristic towers with waterfalls surround her, with a sunlit waterway pictured down the center of her robes. 1970–present · North America, Sub-Saharan Africa, Global / networked Afrofuturist Design A visual language of Black futures that fuses African and diasporic iconography (pyramids and ankhs, Adinkra and Nsibidi glyphs, textile patterning) with spacecraft, cosmic fields and technology. From Sun Ra's Saturn records and Parliament-Funkadelic's comic-book sleeves to the Wakanda of Black Panther, it uses regal central figures, jewel and metallic colour on deep-space grounds, and pattern as technology to imagine liberation beyond history. A cream poster reads “NEW GROWTH” beside a black, flowing illustration combining a raised-arm human figure, curling stems, spirals, and leafy shoots. Dotted trails, small triangles, and simple branching symbols decorate the sweeping forms. 1900–present · Sub-Saharan Africa Uli & Nsibidi Line and Sign Tradition Two linked graphic languages of southeastern Nigeria. Uli is Igbo women's body and wall painting: freehand lines that swell and taper, spirals and small named motifs set asymmetrically on open ground, so gaps count as much as marks. Nsibidi comprises hundreds of pictographic and abstract signs from the Cross River region, kept chiefly by the Ekpe and Mgbe leopard societies and reserved white on indigo ukara cloth. In 1962 Uche Okeke took uli into modern ink drawing; at Nsukka from the 1970s younger artists, Obiora Udechukwu above all, carried uli and later nsibidi into drawing and painting.

05

More combinations

With Afrofuturist Design

With Uli

Every style combination