African beach calligraphy doodles
Monday, August 24th, 2009
African beach calligraphy doodles by Andrew van der Merwe. “The characters in this piece take their inspiration mainly from the Adinkra symbols of the Akan people of Ghana and the Ivory Coast. The symbols are neither alphabetic nor pictographic like the Egyptian symbols, but rather stylised motifs which were used to convey a range of things from historical events to attitudes, objects and even proverbs. I just like the look of them and like to play with them. I seldom use them in a meaningful way. 
However, what is meaningful for me here is how these symbols convey a sense of the graphic roots of human thought and language so easily forgotten in typical Western writing which is much more abstract. For example, the Adinkra symbol for patience, fondness and care is a wooden hair comb. Size: about 6x6m”
