Description
Volume 6 of the Contact Zones Series is presenting the work of photographer Ananias Leki Dago. Born in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, he is one of the most prominent photographers of contemporary African art. Travelling has become an essential source of his work: the Caribbean, the Middle East and also various parts of Europe and Africa. This book is the result of a residency by him with the Goethe-Institut Kenya in Nairobi in 2011.
Ananias Leki Dago chose to work on mabati, Kiswahili for the lightweight building material made of corrugated iron, which is ubiquitous in Nairobi. This series of black/white photographs is a portrayal of Nairobi’s cityscape and its different worlds. As Simon Njami points it out, “it’s one of Leki Dago’s secrets. He does not attack his subjects head on, he is rather interested in the details, as if he were constructing a puzzle that he would bring back for us to reassemble. He works through subtle nuances, through fragments of a larger whole.”
The additional essays by curator and writer Simon Njami as well as writer and Kwani? editor Billy Kahora comment on Ananias Leki Dago’s portrait of Nairobi. The texts are in English.
