Hints of Ideas
Affinities between photographers in the Tender Photo archive
Images that hold conceptual credentials, indicating a mood or feeling besides the immediate scene.
“Private Black Lives.”
I love to take photos that feature a human presence, without the human body itself. In this case, a limb animated the scene; to whom it belongs matters little. I love the composition and the content of the photograph. I was visiting my now-101 year old grandfather, which I only get to do once a year when I come home, and I love how consistent and predictable and familiar his home is. And yet I always find something beautiful and new that captures my attention.
— Kwena Chokoe
“No Ordinary Sky.”
As a photographer that is in love with, and introduced to scenery through the street, I'm ready to capture what feels right. It's a gut feeling almost. The photograph is special to me because it feels like brighter days are coming. It's like a reminder that I am here.
— Tsion Haileselassie
“Slow on Sundays.”
I walked the entire Makola area on three consecutive Sundays to take photographs. This photograph was taken as I walked the marketplace on one of those Sundays. It was simple: I saw a relevant scene that I was drawn to, I positioned myself well, I pressed the shutter.
— moshood
“Patina.”
I took the photograph while waiting. I was waiting for someone dear to me to come around when the colour of the road sign caught my attention. Rusted green over a backdrop of fresh green grass. A slate-colored car, a slate-colored prop. The colour coordination was listless and dark. It is a testament of what one feels after graduating from a university. What is next? Where should I go? Should I follow this or that road?
— Mayowa Oyewale
“Something To Do.”
I was two semesters into my second university and as unmotivated as my last day at my previous school. I hated leaving my room and did so infrequently. It's easy to draw a black swan conclusion as to why I went out that evening, but I prefer to think of it as a mystery because it was on my way that this photo found me. I was never the sort of person to use my phone camera. But all that changed after I took this photo—and decided again and again that I would "just take a photo."
— Tam Olobio
“Gambia'Barra: On Memory.”
Mesmerized by the body of water and the warm golden light of the early hours reflecting off it, I kept thinking about the people who had crossed these same waters around 300 years ago, being carried away into slavery, unsure if these same waters would ever see them return. Observing the people who now willingly commute on the same waters, I try to look for signs of liberation in their body language, what they have brought with them, how they hold these objects, the way they stand or sit on their journey, how they move and interact with each other.
— Adïam Yemane
This is the third edition of AFFINITIES. Every Friday in March and April, I’m rereading the statements by the 100 photographers featured between February 9, 2022 and January 10, 2024, and finding affinities between how they describe their themes or process. Read the previous editions here and here.
TENDER PHOTO is a bi-weekly newsletter on African photography. Every Wednesday we feature a photograph and a short caption about it, and include a statement from the photographer. Every Friday, we publish commentaries or photo-essays in response to photographs previously featured on the newsletter. Our goal is to engage with early to mid-career African photographers by creating a platform in which they lead the cataloguing and engagement with their work.