In the beginning of the 21st century, we could count the number of diversified and professional photographers in Nigeria on our fingers. This number has seen some drastic improvement over the years and today, we now have a lot of photographers with different styles, and flourishing in different sectors of the field such as fashion, portrait, and conceptual photography, to mention but a few.
In all the beauty of photography these photographers put out, we would be appreciating all the time, thought, education and resources the conceptual photographer puts into making every project a piece of fine art. Conceptual photography is a type of photography that best illustrates an idea. An example in the earliest staged photographs is Hippolyte Bayard’s self-portrait as a Drowned Man (1840).
The name spotlighted would not be all the popular names in photography, but they would have your eyes nonetheless.
Ima Mfon
Who is Ima Mfon?
Ima is a Lagos based editorial and fine art photographer interested in exploring issues of social and
cultural identity. He also spends his time in the U.S. where he received his undergraduate degree
at the University of Texas and, later, a higher degree in digital photography at the School
of Visual Arts, New York.
His critically acclaimed project, Nigerian Identity, was featured on CNN and prints from this series
have been shown in several cities including Lagos, New York, San Francisco, Barcelona, and Milan. His
project was also exhibited during Art Basel, at the Miami Pulse Art Fair (2015).
Ima also periodically collaborates with Bloomberg, covering stories that showcase less reported
aspects of Nigerian culture, such as the thriving video game and Nollywood communities in
Lagos. Most recently Ima collaborated with Vice Sports UK, photographing a series of young
football players he encountered on the streets, and interviewing them to understand their
passion for the sport.
Ima was a recipient of the 2015 Lensculture Emerging Talents Award and at the esteemed Fotofest
portfolio review (2016) he received commitments for several solo exhibitions of the Nigerian Identity
series. Ima continues to work out of his home studio in Lagos, and operates under the Instagram handle @Ima_Mfon.
Chocolate
What does photography mean to you?
To me, photography is a form of introspection. Each person produces from the abundance of his or her heart. So, by attempting to understand my mental and emotional processes, I’m able to create work. So, to me, photography is a quest to understand myself better.
