AFRICA STATE OF MIND

Africa State of Mind: Contemporary Photography of a Continent gathers together the work of an emergent generation of photographers from across the continent, exploring Africa as a psychological space as much as a geographical one. Emerging from an exhibition of the same name presented by curator Ekow Eshun in Nottingham in 2018, the collection is presented in four thematic sections – “Hybrid Cities,” “Inner Landscapes,” “Zones of Freedom,” and “Myth and Memory”. Each part presents selections of work by a new wave of African photographers who are looking both outward and inward: capturing life among the sprawling cities of the continent, turning the continent’s history into the source of resonant new myths, and exploring questions of gender, sexuality, and identity. Eshun explains: “On one hand, there is the boosterism of an ‘Africa rising’ narrative, that celebrates the development of an emergent middle class and the growth of a tech sector driven by a young aspirational population, while glossing over the inequalities of income and opportunity that still hinders social progress in many countries. On the other hand, the reductive stereotype of Africa as a land of would-be migrants and corrupt rulers – a vision given ugly validation by President Trump’s description of its nations as “shithole countries”.

Thames and Hudson, $60 (out in April)