Local craft dates as far back as 2000 years, which is the dating for the oldest culture south of the Sahara. As far back as then, guilds, families or associations, or groups managed crafts.
During the colonial days they contributed to the royal finance. One great patronage then was the royal family. Craft helped to maintain the status of the rulers: Many craft products in Nigeria are connected with the basic needs of food and clothing. The potter, calabash carver, basket-maker and woodcarver make containers used in the preparation and storage of food and drink.
The weaver and dyer manufacture or decorate cloth made from natural fibers.
Discoveries made by the archeologists, and reports written by early travelers such as Al-Umari who lived in the fourteen century, confirm that these crafts have been in existence for years.
The techniques used have remained constant. The materials used by the craftsmen of Nigeria vary according to the environment. A rural craftsman uses raw materials which are cheap and easily available.
The religion and social organization of a group influence the type of objects produced by its craftsmen and also the designs used to decorate them. In some parts of Nigeria the practice of certain crafts was restricted to members of one sex only.
Among the Yoruba, potters and dyers were always women, while metal workers and carvers were men. Both men and women wove cloth, but on different types of looms- horizontal for men and vertical for women. Crafts products are distributed through markets. Each market has specific areas devoted to specific craft products, so its easy to compare and select.
The works of craftsmen embellished buildings and adorned their inhabitants.
The life of the town was visibly enriched by the contributions of her craftsmen, who through their skill and sense of design created objects in harmony with the environment. The production of crafts shows that there was indigenous technology as far back as Nok culture days.
Types of Local Craft Business
Textile fabric decoration, tie & dye, batik and soft toy making Ceramics (pottery) flower vases, ash trays, mugs etc.
Wood carving
Ivory carving
Calabash decoration
Metal works (Brass works)
Leather work
Raffia and Grass weaving
Bead work, e.t.c.
Characteristics of Local Crafts
Most crafts are manipulated by use of hands to produce the products.
They are mainly produced or executed by the local people or graduate of informal schools.
Crafts help to preserve our cultural heritage.
The end products of some crafts are partronisized by the chiefs and the noble in the society.
Some crafts are restricted to places where the raw materials can be sourced
e.g Leather craft from the north, cane craft from the south.
It is a vocation that can be acquired, through a process called 'learning-by-doing'.
Local motifs are used mostly for the decoration on craft objects.
THE NIGERIAN ART
Nigeria consists of many tribes, languages, dialects with different cultures. Nigeria is artistically rich.
Those differences in culture are reflected in the art of these different people or groups. Nigeria is one of the African countries that had made a considerable impact in the art of the entire African continent.
Ancient (traditional) Nigerian art are expressed in various forms - stylized, naturalistic and symbolic. Such symbols like the ancestral spirits and diseases are common in the traditional Nigerian artworks. The common media used include wood, clay, bronze, stones and even body decoration or scarification.
There has been no civilization which has not had its artistic tradition.
We know today through art objects that have been found that important civilization existed in Nigeria before the advent of the Europeans. The Nok, Ife and Benin cultures are known to the historians mainly because of the art objects found in these areas.
NOK CULTURE
Introduction
Looking at this oldest art tradition in Nigeria, one has to vividly consider the discovery, characteristics, style, interpretation of the figures and forms, its influence or effect on other sculptural art traditions from other places in Nigeria.
NOK got its name from a small village
"NOK" near Jemaa in Kaduna state and close to Jos Plateau. It was Bernard Fagg who named the art works after the village. The name "NOK" which represents the oldest of Tae sculpture traditions in Nigeria and Africa, South of the Sahara derives from the name of the present day Ham village from which the sculpture pieces were discovered.
The sculptures were discovered over a very large spance of land, covering more than five hundred kilometres, with more concentrations around Jemaa and Katsina-Ala. This is in contrast with the discovery of other arcient sculpture traditions elsewhere, found within limited site areas.
Discovery:
The first discovery took place in 1928 by Colonel J. Dent Young, a co-owner of a tin mining outfit around NOK. It was a head of a monkey, which was being washed out of the tin-bearing gravels. This he took to Jos and kept it at the small museum own by the Department of Mines. Its importance gained more popularity after the second discovery in 1943 of the 'Jemaa' head at Tsauni by a clerk of the tin-mine who was using it as a scare-crow (to ward off intruders into his farm).
The Nok culture has been dated conservatively to between 500BC and 200AD.
From 1928, when the first object was discovered, down to the beginning of the twenty first century, more terracotta heads are being discovered.
Styles and Characteristics:
Nok sculptural pieces are in terracotta (baked clay). High technology was exhibited in firing the works. Evidence of iron smelting technology was found in Nok, with similar technology involved in Igbo-Ukwu and Ife. Nok was, however, the earliest known smelters of iron, south of the Sahara, evidence of which could be seen in the slag from their furnaces and the Tuyeres (clay nozzles) for the bellows found. Choice and mixture of materials and perfect firing of NOK terracotta was extended to Ife and Igbo-
Ukwu.
Animal figures were more represented than the human figures, probably because of fears of witchcraft as cauciously as suggested by Frank Willett (an author on African Art) or because animals play important role in their religious beliefs.
The Nok pieces are highly sophisticated. Particular individuals and animals were singled out and given special treatment in a very complex way. Ife and Igbo-Ukwu share similar qualities.
Human figures from Nok are usually represented in stylized manner; whereas the animal figures are remarkably naturalistic. The lips, ears and the pupils of the eyes are usually pierced. The eye is represented in segment of a sphere.
Nok sculptures show indications of an earlier wood carving tradition. Most of the figures show tendency to formalism; a simplistic treatment of forms and hardly any decorative details.
Mostly stylized, Nok works are characterized with conical, cylindrical and spherical shape with strange open mouth. Sizes vary from few centimeters (about 4cm) to larger examples (about 120cm). Some represent animals such as horses, bush cows, rams and pythons.
0 Comments