# Self-representation in Kemite art  
Interestingly, this grid system was scientifically devised by the Kemites in pursuit of a symmetry which is perfectly represented by a circle in two dimensions and by a sphere in three dimensions. Conceived thus, with pi $(\pi)$ as a universal constant associated with all perfectly circled objects, it becomes apparent that this operating concept was certainly functional in the Kemites' grid system, which went from 18 squares in the Old Kingdom (2600-2137 BCE) to 20 in the New Kingdom to 24 under Nubian rule. What connects all the grid systems is the numerator 3; thus, since the Kemites were the first to square a circle and the first to postulate pi $(\pi)$ (Obenga, 1990), it can be inferred that Plato's notion that art is number perfectly corresponds to the Kmtan model. The Kemites were concerned with harmony and symmetry probably because they understood the creation of the universe (the sep tepy, or 'first occasion') as an issuing from one source of energy; in other words, for the Kemites, the universe was kept in balance by one force. The use of the grid system can therefore be assumed to have been based on  
this universalizing concept. By squaring a circle, the grid system was thus invented (Dada Imarogbe, personal communication, 1 December 1995).  
Conceptualizing the artistic standards, conventions and traditions according to which the ancient Kmtan artists developed their genius and extended it to the rest of the world, Wolff states that the intention of his book was 'to point continually to artistic experiments, to peculiarities of form, and to certain motifs that spread from Egypt and Mesopotamia to the West' (Wolff, 1972, p. 5). According to Bogoslovsky's description, the Kmtu took a methodical and clinical approach to the creation of a work of art, considering the following before initiating its actual creation: