HAKIM JONES
Savannah collector on the BEAUTY of Kufic script, geometric patterns, and unquestioning generosity.
There is power in material objects and Hakim Jones – a native of Savannah – knows that well after more than thirty years of collecting. His collection ranges from Gullah-Geechee culture, civil rights paraphernalia, early African photography, Islam in a global context, and African-American music and religious life. For Mr. Jones, the preservation of these objects is an essential task to understanding our humanity, even at times, our inhumanity. He collects things that can sometimes be difficult to look at, difficult to confront – humans in their darkest hour – but he sees value in confronting those challenges of the past in pursuit of a better future. His most prized discovery is an original drum made by an enslaved person in the low country, not unlike the Akan Drum in the British Museum. ‘That is the rarest thing I own,’ says Mr. Jones, ‘because drumming was outlawed following the 1739 Stono Rebellion in South Carolina, and therefore the objects associated with it were prohibited.’ Finding one, let alone owning one, is an extreme rarity few can claim. Seeing a fraction of his vast collection at his Savannah home was a privilege, and it was an even greater honor to sit down and talk with Mr. Jones about his experience of the beautiful. Our conversation was far broader than what is captured here – ranging from racism, to politics, to faith. It left me with a distinct appreciation for the richness of our community and for the importance of conversation.
How did you first become aware of beauty?
I became aware of beauty as a small boy while attending church in Savannah, which was mandatory when I was young. On the first Sunday of the month we had to go twice, once in the morning and then again in the afternoon. Because there was no air conditioning, they would leave the big windows open without any screens and I remember looking at the sky – that was what I contemplated as the time passed. They also had these fans and one of them had a fall scene of Vermont – with all these vivid autumnal colors. Both of those experiences captured my imagination and helped me become aware of beauty, especially beauty within nature.
Can you describe one of your most memorable encounters with beauty?
When I converted to Islam, I became entranced through my faith with the Islamic manuscript tradition. Islamic law does not permit the use of animal or human figures and because of that limitation it forced people to develop ingenious floral and geometric designs. It can take years to develop the skills to craft such precise patterns – made so perfectly they look like a machine did it – but they were painted by hand.
Double Page from the Qur’an, Safavid dynasty (1501–1722), 16th century, opaque watercolor and gold on paper, each page 31.8 × 21.0 cm (12 1/2 × 8 1/4 in.), Ann McNear Collection, Art Institute of Chicago.
In becoming a Muslim, I was exposed to many other people, new things, new ideas, different food, different music. It was that experience that reminded me of what the civil rights activist W.W. Law once told me ‘it is one thing to be well read, but it is more important to be widely read.’ It’s important to be exposed to difference; as the Qur’an teaches, God didn’t create different people to despise each other, but to learn from each other.
What are the terms or forms of beauty that most speak to you?
People might say that a painting done by Monet or Picasso is beauty, but that is a certain type. My life is dominated by the beauty of the kufic script. This is somewhat new to the contemporary Western mind, but not really new at all; real thinkers in the Western world recognized this beauty long ago. However it is not just the beauty of the aesthetic forms, but also the content of the subject, the text itself. While it is written in this extraordinary manner, it is also, and more importantly, the word of God. Here form and content come together. For example, you might have a beautiful script that says ‘fa inna ma’al usri yusra’ or ‘surely with all difficulty comes ease’. It is aesthetically pleasing and has a practical use; that is what is important.
An extraordinary feat of calligraphy, this Qur’an represents a seldom-seen level of artistic perfection. Two of the period’s best-known artists, Ahmad al-Suhrawardi and Muhammad ibn Aybak, transcribed and illuminated the manuscript. The Mongol ruler Uljaytu (reigned 1304–16), a descendent of Genghis Khan, commissioned it for his monumental tomb in Sultaniyya, in northwestern Iran.
There are beautiful objects or experiences, but also beautiful actions. What is the most beautiful act or actions you have seen?
When people give money to those who are homeless without asking questions – that is a beautiful act. A lot of times when people do give money, they count it first, then give instructions – like ‘you don’t need to go out and do this or do that’ – but the person who gives money and asks no questions, who hands it over freely, is doing a beautiful act.
Does beauty make you a better person and how?
Beauty can help call our attention to the detail of the world and the interconnection between things. There is so much out there, so much to impress and be used. A lot of things we take for granted. Take for example, the simple apple. If you took the seed out, it might not seem like anything special. But from that seed came an apple tree with apples to eat, to juice, and from the apple tree a home for animals, from the wood came material to make a house, etc. All of that came from that little seed. In the Qur’an, it says creation is unlimited; if you were to take your eyes and look out in the world and draw your eyes back and look out again they say your eyes would become weary.
How do you cultivate a sense of the beauty in your everyday life?
I occasionally carve canes, although this tradition, which goes back to the African master wood carvers, is something of a dead craft in this region. Unlike basket making, which had more of a demand because of its utility, the only person who needed a cane was an older person, and so there wasn’t really a market for those. But several years ago, I taught myself to do woodworking and started making simple rustic furniture for Bob Christian Decorative Art and then interior designer John Rosselli (who called my work ‘beautifully crude’) and then I started carving canes. I did so without realizing that my father, Willis Jones Senior, had done so in his youth; and when I started doing it, he took it up again too. So my contribution to the artistic world, to cultivating a sense of beauty in the everyday, I suppose is doing something with my hands.
Photo courtesy of Hakim Jones.