Chike Aniakor
[4] During his time at Indiana University, his paintings and poetry were displayed at numerous art shows, granting him public recognition and academic fellowships, including the Rockefeller Award.
[8] In addition, he helped train students to understand Uli art ideology, painting, and history by exhibiting modern intellectualism towards the subject.
Aniakor developed the Nsukka Art Department with other staff members who worked at the University of Nigeria with him to help expand upon Igbo stylistic range.
[4][10] During the 1970s, Nigerian artist Uche Okeke worked with Aniakor to establish the Nsukka group, an association consisting of members from the department to focus on producing and reviving the Uli style of art.
Traditionally, Uli consisted of geometric shapes, symbols, motifs, and patterns, using plants and other materials derived from earth to decorate walls and bodies, usually during ceremonies.
He provided awareness of the elements used within Uli motifs, which he saw as dialogical to the negative space surrounding it in his works, as well as Nigerian cultural history beyond rituality to construct conceptual considerations.
[24] He further aimed to transform Uli into one of both social landscape as well as spirituality involving the cosmos, exploring that facet within Igbo society by combining celestial images and his own imagery.
With floral-like curves, linear texture mixed with mass form was frequently combined in Aniakor's work to achieve rhythm.
Curvilinear linework was a staple in Uli art as Aniakor wrote that it was element that made artworks most visually appealing to the eye.
Issues of military control in Nigeria continue to be a sensitive subject for Igbo artists, with their work being a response to the disappointments they endured.
[3] Civil strife was the main theme within Aniakors personal work concerning the Nigerian-Biafran war, with focus brought to the act of social unrest in the Igbo community at the time.
[24] Using bold lines, optical illusions, linear contours, and negative space he aimed to create a sensation of movement to depict messages of people physically moving away from troubled zones.
These were symbolic of the fear the Igbo community felt at the time, and how the use of rhythm indicated Aniakor's understanding of how war and movement work together as a design structure within artworks.
The use of crowded figures aimed to tell the story of despair that people endured under military authority, using this as a method to communicate Aniakor's own personal and political statements.
[29] Aniakor's work from 1970 to 2000 continued to represent the relationship that the Igbo community had to Nigerian military regimes as they simultaneously captured the socioeconomic state of Nigeria at the time.
[24] Using images of aggregation and spatial design helped translate his concerns of the constant conflict implemented between military junta and the Nigerian masses, demonstrating an imbalanced system.
[3] Historical development and stylistic analysis were two additional things that shaped Aniakors writings, frequently labeling his poetry as visual epitaphs.
