Announcing the Tender Photo Editorial Fellows 2025

Adéwùnmí Adébáyọ̀, Haja Fanta, Max Diallo Jakobsen, Michelle Angwenyi, and Tony Agbapuonwu.

We are pleased to announce the successful applicants to the Tender Photo Editorial Fellowship 2025. 

From March to August, the Fellows will engage in a range of activities intended to deepen their engagement with photography produced on the African continent. Launched in 2024, the Fellowship supports writers and curators with interest in art writing, criticism, and arts journalism.

Beginning with the April 2 issue of the newsletter, the 2025 Fellows will initiate and facilitate correspondence with photographers, write short narrative captions, and prepare the newsletter for publication. They will also participate in two masterclasses led by Emmanuel Iduma and Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀, the first focused on critical responses to photographs, and the second on how photographs can inspire the writing of fiction. Finally, over the course of the fellowship, each Fellow will be supported to develop a longer piece of writing.

Join me in congratulating the following individuals in this esteemed cohort!

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Adéwùnmí Adébáyọ̀ (‘wùnmíbáyọ̀) (NIGERIA) explores history, culture, art, politics, and development in his writing. His works are investigative in character beginning with the question, How did we get here? His interests are in documenting fading traditions, deciphering hidden meanings in visual arts, and examining history through etymology and language. He writes for exhibitions and artists like Badru Abiodun and Tosin Toromade. He leads a creative team focused on perception management for brands, and documents the world through photography for leisure.

Haja Fanta (SENEGAL) is a curator, researcher, and writer with a diverse and international practice. Her research focuses on artistic and cultural production from West Africa and its diaspora, the relationship between art and society, and the role of the archive. She is an Assistant Curator, RAW Material Company. She is also the founder of Studio Marrah, a research-driven curatorial studio dedicated to crafting cohesive and engaging projects in the realm of arts and culture.

Max Diallo Jakobsen (GUINEA) is an artist, writer, and historian whose work is born out of investigations into material imaginaries. His research delves into intimate, often forgotten histories, focusing on how material practices and photographic archives shape collective memory. With a particular focus on Guinea’s fragmented visual history, Max’s ongoing projects explore the conceptual and analytical intersections between analogue photography and textile dyeing, and how artists engage with the archival presences and absences inherent to the postcolonial condition.

Michelle Angwenyi (KENYA) is a writer from Nairobi. Her work has appeared in A Long House, Transnational Literature, Jalada, Transition Magazine, TSA Art Magazine, the poetry anthology Wild Imperfections (Penguin Random House/Cassava Republic Press, 2021) and elsewhere. She was shortlisted for the 2017 Short Story Day Africa Prize and the 2018 Brunel Africa International Poetry Prize, and is the author of Gray Latitudes, selected for the New Generation African Poets Chapbook series (Akashic Books, 2020). 

Tony Agbapuonwu (NIGERIA) is a curator, writer, and strategy consultant. He is the founder of Art Bridge Project, a community-based visual art organization and think tank for artists. His curatorial work explores experiential and material poetics, commenting on social, cultural, and political history to amplify art's transformative power. With over 10 years in Nigeria's cultural landscape, he currently serves as Residency and Onsite Program Manager at Kòbọmọjẹ Artist Residency in Ibadan.

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TENDER PHOTO is a digital platform of African photography, founded by Emmanuel Iduma. Our aim is to engage with life on the African continent through photography. We publish narratives about the people, places, and events pictured in photographs, contributing to nuanced and layered perceptions. The newsletter also read on web (best for viewing images), and via the Substack iOS/Android apps.

Every Wednesday we feature a photograph, a short caption about it, and a statement from the photographer. In the past, we have published commentaries or photo-essays in response to photographs previously featured on the newsletter, including CORRESPONDENCES, CONCORDANCE, KINDRED, INDEX, and AFFINITIES.

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