From the days of reading Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the Shoemaker and the Elf, Alice in Wonderland, The Sorcerer’s apprentice; Little Red Riding Hood, Gulliver’s Travels and The Pied Piper of Hamelin even the Emperor’s New Clothes, one thing stood out.
We read them itching to flip the pages, on hindsight, not because we wanted the stories to end, but more because we wanted to see the photos that accompanied the material we read.
Then we graduated to much bigger books that kept taking away – better still, stealthily – leaving us with more words and lesser photos. The Famous Six, Robin Hood, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Harry Potter and others did just that. The latter had horrible illustrations accompanying their fairy-tale storylines.
African writers came in at a point but there was a bunch who were VERY POOR at incorporating illustrations. You hardly got any illustrations from most African writers – disclaimer, African writers I have read.
Ok, so after years of being motivated by our late dad to read, I think all my sisters – Mariam, Fuleira and Sharifa – have abandoned ship, I can say for myself, Sherif and our boss, Rayhann – we have remained on track with reading.
I do so on a monthly basis. Reading is hard work, it does take effort, it comes with challenges and all – a story for another day. The Quran is my most consistent reading document then my book for the month.
Let me add, there are months, I have failed to finish reading a book – twice this year. Fire and Fury and Ghana Must Go, I abandoned them with a plan to return to them. I love to borrow books, simple reason being that I’m challenged to finish and return them.
So for the month of September, I did an e-book, Chinua Achebe’s No Longer At Ease, find my review here. October was for a borrowed book, Briget Uzezi (Mrs. Macron), a colleague tweeted about a book, I requested to have it on Twitter and she delivered it – the physical copy.
The book was ‘Africa Under The Prism,’ I thought I was going to be handed a philosophical, continental, apocalyptical and psychosocial analytical piece of writing by some author.
First sight, oops, this must be some bulky piece of work. All smiley, I thanked Brigette and set out to peruse it. For the first time I was to read a photo book, no wait; do you read photos? It had a riveting foreword and intros worth reading anytime, any day.
The book was a collection of photos displayed over five years of the famed Lagos Photo festival. It technically meant there were hundreds of authors – i.e. the photographers whose clicks had contributed to the thoughtful, colourful and fanciful array of snaps.
I used the word ‘bewitched’ because for the first time, I finished reading a book but had the urge to go all over and a weird feeling of not wanting to return it to its owner.
The photos got you into a long trance jumping reality, confronting fiction, delving into the minds of the men and women behind the cameras, probing motives and motifs, fighting the rogue illustrations, wondering how perspectives were forced into focus.
Here is a rundown of five years of Lagos boxed into the pages of the bulky black pages of ‘Africa Under the Prism,’ Contemporary African Photography From LagosPhoto Festival.
Author: Hatje Cantz, a German
Introduction: Azu Nwagbogu – Director and Founder of LPF.
Photographers: 140 plus
Photo count: roughly 345
Years in focus: 2010 – 2014
Intro Summary: Nwagbogu digs into how being cut off from the world at a point inspired the need to start a photo festival for Lagos. He captures the spirit and letter of LPF chiefly to fight often negative press coverage. Apparently, LPF led to the ‘Everyday Africa’ Instagram pages.
Final four sentences in the introduction: “I have always argued that as Africans we need to re-imagine our tomorrow and we can learn from those on the margins, the visionaries and fantasists
“If we do not, we will find ourselves trapped in a vicious cycle corrupted by a false history and manipulated by contemporary media.
“Let us visualize and then realise a better, safer, more united continent that artists and cultural visionaries can crystalize and promulgate.
“When photographers and artists achieve this, perhaps then, we are able to fulfill our stated organizational goal: to unite the world through images.”
Breakdown of the years 2010 – 2014
Year, Theme: 2010, No judgment, Africa Under the Prism
Introduction: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Number of photos: 42
Photographer roll: 25
My best themes: Lagos street economics, Amarya, Power of Education
Year, Theme: 2011, What Next Africa? The Hidden Stories
Introduction: Marc Prust
Number of photos: 81
Photographer roll: 41
My best themes: China in Benin, Water No Get Enemy, Diamond Matters
Year, Theme: 2012, Seven Days In The Life Of Lagos
Introduction: Joseph Gergel
Number of photos: 70
Photographer roll: 29
My best themes: Makoko, E-Waste, Sand Merchants
Year, Theme: 2013, The Mega-City And The Non-City
Introduction: Unnamed author
Number of photos: 75
Photographer roll: 37
My best themes: Re-enactments, State Of The Nation, Poverty Photography
Year, Theme: 2014, Staging Reality, Documenting Fiction
Introduction: Unnamed author
Number of photos: 77
Photographer roll: 40
My best themes: Nigerian punishments, Maternal Culture, Red Gold
I’ll attempt to delve into each year in a separate write up – I’m not promising you, I promise myself, until then, I return Brigette’s book to her. Get reading.
We read them itching to flip the pages, on hindsight, not because we wanted the stories to end, but more because we wanted to see the photos that accompanied the material we read.
Then we graduated to much bigger books that kept taking away – better still, stealthily – leaving us with more words and lesser photos. The Famous Six, Robin Hood, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Harry Potter and others did just that. The latter had horrible illustrations accompanying their fairy-tale storylines.
African writers came in at a point but there was a bunch who were VERY POOR at incorporating illustrations. You hardly got any illustrations from most African writers – disclaimer, African writers I have read.
Ok, so after years of being motivated by our late dad to read, I think all my sisters – Mariam, Fuleira and Sharifa – have abandoned ship, I can say for myself, Sherif and our boss, Rayhann – we have remained on track with reading.
I do so on a monthly basis. Reading is hard work, it does take effort, it comes with challenges and all – a story for another day. The Quran is my most consistent reading document then my book for the month.
Let me add, there are months, I have failed to finish reading a book – twice this year. Fire and Fury and Ghana Must Go, I abandoned them with a plan to return to them. I love to borrow books, simple reason being that I’m challenged to finish and return them.
So for the month of September, I did an e-book, Chinua Achebe’s No Longer At Ease, find my review here. October was for a borrowed book, Briget Uzezi (Mrs. Macron), a colleague tweeted about a book, I requested to have it on Twitter and she delivered it – the physical copy.
The book was ‘Africa Under The Prism,’ I thought I was going to be handed a philosophical, continental, apocalyptical and psychosocial analytical piece of writing by some author.
First sight, oops, this must be some bulky piece of work. All smiley, I thanked Brigette and set out to peruse it. For the first time I was to read a photo book, no wait; do you read photos? It had a riveting foreword and intros worth reading anytime, any day.
The book was a collection of photos displayed over five years of the famed Lagos Photo festival. It technically meant there were hundreds of authors – i.e. the photographers whose clicks had contributed to the thoughtful, colourful and fanciful array of snaps.
I used the word ‘bewitched’ because for the first time, I finished reading a book but had the urge to go all over and a weird feeling of not wanting to return it to its owner.
The photos got you into a long trance jumping reality, confronting fiction, delving into the minds of the men and women behind the cameras, probing motives and motifs, fighting the rogue illustrations, wondering how perspectives were forced into focus.
Here is a rundown of five years of Lagos boxed into the pages of the bulky black pages of ‘Africa Under the Prism,’ Contemporary African Photography From LagosPhoto Festival.
Author: Hatje Cantz, a German
Introduction: Azu Nwagbogu – Director and Founder of LPF.
Photographers: 140 plus
Photo count: roughly 345
Years in focus: 2010 – 2014
Intro Summary: Nwagbogu digs into how being cut off from the world at a point inspired the need to start a photo festival for Lagos. He captures the spirit and letter of LPF chiefly to fight often negative press coverage. Apparently, LPF led to the ‘Everyday Africa’ Instagram pages.
Final four sentences in the introduction: “I have always argued that as Africans we need to re-imagine our tomorrow and we can learn from those on the margins, the visionaries and fantasists
“If we do not, we will find ourselves trapped in a vicious cycle corrupted by a false history and manipulated by contemporary media.
“Let us visualize and then realise a better, safer, more united continent that artists and cultural visionaries can crystalize and promulgate.
“When photographers and artists achieve this, perhaps then, we are able to fulfill our stated organizational goal: to unite the world through images.”
Breakdown of the years 2010 – 2014
Year, Theme: 2010, No judgment, Africa Under the Prism
Introduction: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Number of photos: 42
Photographer roll: 25
My best themes: Lagos street economics, Amarya, Power of Education
Year, Theme: 2011, What Next Africa? The Hidden Stories
Introduction: Marc Prust
Number of photos: 81
Photographer roll: 41
My best themes: China in Benin, Water No Get Enemy, Diamond Matters
Year, Theme: 2012, Seven Days In The Life Of Lagos
Introduction: Joseph Gergel
Number of photos: 70
Photographer roll: 29
My best themes: Makoko, E-Waste, Sand Merchants
Year, Theme: 2013, The Mega-City And The Non-City
Introduction: Unnamed author
Number of photos: 75
Photographer roll: 37
My best themes: Re-enactments, State Of The Nation, Poverty Photography
Year, Theme: 2014, Staging Reality, Documenting Fiction
Introduction: Unnamed author
Number of photos: 77
Photographer roll: 40
My best themes: Nigerian punishments, Maternal Culture, Red Gold
I’ll attempt to delve into each year in a separate write up – I’m not promising you, I promise myself, until then, I return Brigette’s book to her. Get reading.
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