The language and rhythm of African people have been an obsession throughout my life.  I can still vividly remember the heavy syrupy dialect that impregnated my ears as a small boy, the hypnotic rhythm-ming of the body movements of African people that continue to sang to me, and the depth of the wellsprings silently stirring inside the language forged in the North American experience of African people.  By means of my tonal drawings, I am trying to actualize this experience-ing for the benefit of us all.

         I am Asili Ya Nadhiri, born on August 29, 1944 in Durham, North Carolina and raised in a small tobacco town named Clinton, North Carolina.  My undergraduate education took place at Hampton Institute and Ithaca College, Masters at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, and ABD (all but dissertation) at the University of Florida in Gainesville.  I have been an instructor of vocational agriculture and social studies in the Orange County Public School System (Orlando, Florida) for the past thirty-two years.