Link: Bridging Approaches to Mental Illness in Sierra Leone – NYTimes.com
“The history of the war is everywhere,” said Nyani Quarmyne, a Ghanaian photographer who visited last year. “There are bombed-out buildings all over the place. There are people wandering around with both their hands hacked off.”
Nyani Quarmyne and Nii Obodai, Ghanaian photographers, have set out to document climate change, photograph West Africa and beyond, undo stereotypes and upend expectations, with a subtle eye and nuanced view.
via Lens Blog: http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/12/africans-documenting-africa/
The two men are well suited to presenting a view of Africa to Africans and others beyond the continent. Their work — now at “We Face Forward,” a series of art exhibitions on display through Sept. 16 in Manchester, England — is part of a burgeoning effort to challenge the conventional, Western understanding of Africa as helpless, diseased and war-addled: a continent of victims.
“We’re documenting for ourselves what life is and where it’s going,” Mr. Obodai said. “It’s documentation of Africa by Africans. “