Web Ashanti Prints

This article appeared in the Winter 1994-95 issue of Logo Exchange volume 13 Number 2

The Printing Turtle Exhibited

by Orlando Mihich and his students

The need to create and appreciate things of beauty,
to create and enjoy art
is a vital and joyful part of life.

Introduction
Two years ago, when I ventured into setting up an African Textiles exhibit, I promised myself not to repeat the experience very soon. But in the end, the exhibit turned out to be successful and great fun for me and my students, and was worth all the work and all the invested time. This year, I showed the exhibition's VCR tape to my seventh grade students. They liked very much everything they saw, from the Logo screens to the music and the interviews. They never thought that what they were doing at the computer could be used in a public exhibit. They were also immediately interested to know if in this class they will be doing something similar to the work they saw on tape. And why not? I thought, if Hollywood can produce a Home Alone 2, we could have an African Textiles 2.
Two of my former students, Myckele Spencer and Michael Toribio, came to visit me and expressed the desire to continue working with Logo and to work on a project with me and my students. We started to explore more textiles designs, but no one was enthusiastic about repeating the work done two years ago. We came to the realization that African textiles were already explored, done, and over.
During our exploratory work, we encountered the printing stamps of the Ashanti people, and liked them very much. They had great Logo potential. From various sources, I put together a folder on Ashanti prints and xeroxed it for the whole class. I worked on the prints with my seventh grade class during regular class time, and in the after-school computer club with Myckele and Michael, who formally joined the club as "Assistants to the Ashanti Project ." Three female students joined the project in the after school hours, and created some of the most beautiful screens. The generated stamps were not simply copies of the originals, they assumed a new personal form. Sometimes the design changed to accommodate the student's imagination and/or the computer screen.
I am always moved, and always impressed when my former students help in teaching my new students. Myckele, by the way, visited Russia last summer through an NYU students' exchange program. After Moscow, he visited Turkmenistan and Ashgbad and found that they were using Logo. In his own words, he impressed the students there by first overcoming some difficulties with their keyboard, and later doing "some tessellations" for them (!).

I made this
with my eyes,
and chose to use
these stamp
and these patterns.
Their combination
pleases me.

Celeste Wenegieme

The Exhibit
When enough screens were generated at my school, we contacted the Black Books Plus Bookstore's owner, Ms. Glenderlyn Johnson, who once again kindly agreed to host the exhibit. A flyer was displayed in local stores to announce the exhibit, invitations were given and mailed out, and a pamphlet was generated to familiarize the public with the content and meaning of the Ashanti stamps. After two and a half months of intensive work, my students held an exhibition of "Ashanti Prints" on February 4, 1994. It happened in between two snow storms and persistent below freezing temperatures. Still, quite a few visitors came to the opening, and the exhibit was a success judging from the interviews and the visitors' book.
The primary inspirational sources for the exhibit's screens and pamphlet were: the book African Textile by John Picton & John Mack (Harper & Row, NY, 1989); African Designs by Geoffrey Williams (Dover Publications, Inc. NY, 1971); publications and tapes on the subject from the Museum of African Art, Washington, D.C.
After the opening, my students transferred the colorful Apple IIgs screens onto a VCR tape, added some African drum music, and included the interviews from the show's opening.
In addition, during this school year, I taught three evening minicourses in "Programming and Word Processing" for parents. It gave parents an understanding of what their children are learning in school and of why the Logo language has been adopted as a learning tool in schools throughout this country, and from Australia to Costa Rica. The parents loved the experience and continued working with Logo at home even after the course was over. Finally, it gives me great satisfaction to have brought my students to the level where they felt themselves to be experts, programmers and artists, in front of the public, the community, and have at the same time involved their parents with the turtle.

I made this with my heart to honor
Black History Month.

Quanne Duncan

Ram's Horns
Strength of mind and
body. Humility.

Shaun Jamison

I made this with
my feelings,
and LogoWriter.

Tiama Harris

I made this with my
hands, and
designed this
patterns to be
just opposed
with this one.
The contrast
pleases me.

Amit Rawana

I made this with my mind,
and I decided to balance
this design with this one,
and to repeat this design
here, and here.
The balance is satisfactory.

Connie Clarke

Logo Techniques
The procedures used throughout the work were quite simple, mostly triangles, squares, circles, and arcs. Only after students felt comfortable with circles and arcs procedures did I introduce the "tools procedures" to obtain greater screen accuracy.
Following is a sample procedure for one of the stamps:

to adinkra2 :s
lt 90
pu
fd :s
rt 90
pd
circler :s
lt 90
pu
fd :s / 2
rt 90
pd
repeat 9[arcr :s * 1.5 20 lt 90 fd :s * 3 rt 90
arcr :s * 4.5 20 rt 90 fd :s * 3 lt 90]
rt 90
pu
fd :s * 0.25
pd
fill
pu
fd :s * (1.5 - 0.25)
lt 90
end

The thick lines were slowly drawn by the turtle stamping a small square shape; e.g., a 180° arc to the right with a radius of 50 millimeters is written as:
arcr 50 180
arcr :r 180 :r for a variable radius
repeat 180 [arcr :r 1 stamp] repeat 180 to stamp every single degree

Following is an example of what my students otherwise called "bold" drawing:

to sankofa :s
setsh 1
make "a pos
pu fd :s
pd repeat 230[arcr :s * 40 / 25 1 pd stamp]
repeat :s * 90 / 25 [fd 1 pd stamp]
rt 85
repeat :s * 90 / 25 [fd 1 pd stamp]
repeat 230[arcr :s * 40 / 25 1 pd stamp]
seth 190
repeat 180[arcr :s * 28 / 25 1 pd stamp]
repeat 180[arcr :s * 18 / 25 1 pd stamp]
pu setpos :a
seth 180
bk :s pd
seth 170
repeat 180[arcl :s * 28 / 25 1 pd stamp]
repeat 180[arcl :s * 18 / 25 1 pd stamp]
pu setpos :a
end

The Exhibit's Pamphlet

Ashanti Prints

An Exhibition of Logo Screens
by seventh grade students

Printed cloth in Africa can be found along the Swahili coast of Kenya, on the off-shore island of Zanzibar but the most famous printed designs are the well-known "adinkra" cloths of the Ashanti people from Ghana. The material used is plain white cotton cloth, but cloth dyed in various colors from brown to red or green and purple is also used. The materials are locally produced from hand-spun cotton. The pigment used for decorating the cloth is obtained from the bark of a tree by boiling it for several hours into a thick black liquid. The stamps are made from pieces of old calabash carved into different designs. Sticks are pegged on the back of the stamps and tied together to form a handle.
The cloth is stretched flat on the ground and divided into squares by painting with the thick black dye. The various designs are then printed in each of the squares on the cloth.
Adinkra cloth is not just decorative; the stamps help people focus and express their feelings. Some compositions express inner feelings which are sometimes very difficult to put into words. The designs themselves have historical, allegorical or magical significance. They can protect the wearer from evil spirits and/or bring good luck. Adinkra cloth is stamped with symbols, each one with a different meaning to express joy, wealth, wisdom, grief, praise to the Lord, or enigmatic observations about life such as: "When the hippopotamus surfaces and says the crocodile is dead, you shouldn't argue."
The correct placing and repetition of identical designs insures the continuity of the cosmos, and fulfill the duty of maintaining harmony in the universe. Repetition affects time itself. If you repeat the same idea, thought or design over and over, time goes on and on ... forever.

February 1994

The rich man stamp.

Brian Roldan