"Hands of Memory" translates the rhythmic architecture of Mongo Santamaría's "Afro Blue" into visual form. Inspired by his "Afro Roots" album cover, the design explores themes of transculturation and cultural survival through geometric abstraction. Repeating white nodes create visual ostinato, echoing the composition's foundation.
Three concentric rings of varying-sized circles generate visual polyrhythms, converging at precise moments to mirror the tension and release of interlocking percussion patterns. At the center, a photograph of Mongo's blurred hands on a tilted conga drum anchors the composition, emphasizing how sacred Yoruba rhythms survived the Middle Passage through embodied practice rather than written notation.
The work honors Mongo Santamaría's pioneering role in bringing Afro-Cuban percussion into American jazz, transforming ceremonial rhythms dedicated to Obatalá into one of the most influential compositions in jazz history. The mandala-like structure visualizes transculturation not as cultural loss but as transformation, where West African traditions, Cuban folkloric music, and jazz innovation converge to create something entirely new while honoring ancestral roots.
Original Cover Art
The design process began with hand-drawn sketches that were digitized and layered through multiple iterations.
The images below show the experimental designs that informed the final composition.
