Right in front of your eyes

Claudio Silva emailed fellow Angolan, photographer Rui Sérgio Afonso, to tell us about his favorite images.

All images by Rui Sérgio Afonso.

Saying that these are my five favorite photographs would be an injustice to all the others I have taken. Perhaps these five all have different reasons to be included here, like the one above with the children and their improvised sailboats that remind me of the imports that my country is subject to, and that I call “import-export Lebanon China,” the two groups of foreigners that are most common in Angola. The former with their warehouses that supply us with our basic needs such as beans and fuba (ground manioc), and the latter, the new foreigners, that I believe are here to stay, our new colonizers from the Far East.

From the echo the stone makes as it strikes the mabanga (a type of shellfish) that sustains the fishermen of this metropolis that grows right in front of your eyes …to the relative calm of the fisherman’s boat ready for another day at sea.

From the remnants of humanitarian aid that we are subject to every year, so apparent on the improvised boats of Tômbua village in Namibe…

…to the joy of our children as the rains arrive.

They’re all moments that carry me to my childhood where everything was more fun, more honest, realer — that time where they taught us that socialism was the path to follow for the good of our people, the people that I love so much.

Further Reading

No one should be surprised we exist

The documentary film, ‘Rolé—Histórias dos Rolezinhos’ by Afro-Brazilian filmmaker Vladimir Seixas uses sharp commentary to expose social, political, and cultural inequalities within Brazilian society.

Kenya’s stalemate

A fundamental contest between two orders is taking place in Kenya. Will its progressives seize the moment to catalyze a vision for social, economic, and political change?

More than a building

The film ‘No Place But Here’ uses VR or 360 media to immerse a viewer inside a housing occupation in Cape Town. In the process, it wants to challenge gentrification and the capitalist logic of home ownership.