Africa

by Olivier Föllmi, Olivier Föllmi

Those of us who have never had the privilege of visiting Africa can take solace in this splendid pictorial journey across the immense and magnificent continent, courtesy of photographer Olivier Föllmi. A worthy companion to Föllmi’s lovely Offerings for Humanity series, which celebrates the day-to-day spirituality of an entire continent throughout the year, Africa follows India and Homage to the Himalayas in assembling the lensman’s most spectacular pictures of this rich and diverse land. From the deserts of Namibia to the savannah of Cameroon, from the Himba shepherds to the Peul nomads, this moving collection of 200 images takes readers on a voyage of discovery through the heart of African life and thought, revealing a mosaic of cultures and peoples with beauty and depth.

Genres: Africa

216 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Olivier Föllmi willingly describes himself as a “world photographer”.

Profoundly impressed by the Himalayan world, he and his wife, Danielle, founded their family by adopting four Tibetan children. They have also created an educational aid association in the Himalayas : HOPE. This love story has become world renown and has received some of the most prestigious awards.

It was in developing a passion for other lands that Olivier Föllmi has become a great “traveling photographer”. This is the price in which “to have something to share, to say and to show. A perfect photo, but devoid of sense, will never equal a blurry photo with a touching message".

Each of their travels gave birth to a book with photos and texts that are a veritable ode to life and the means to share the emotion with the greatest number of people.

Reviews

[Paul Bryant · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's hard to made a bad photo book when your subject is Africa, but Olivier Follmi has created not just a not-bad book but a gorgeous brilliant one.

Now, the irony of giant luxury photo books whose subject is the poorest countries on earth will not be lost on any of us readers. This book features Namibia, Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad and Ethiopia. This book like the other big ones I have by Steve Bloom and Stefan Schutz is all about rural Africa. The images are so beautiful and arresting that I can see why it might be next to impossible to wrench one's gaze from there to the cities and the shanty towns, but it does seem that there is a whole area remaining to be explored here – the littoral where the country (of traditional ways of life, traditional beliefs) meets the city (that signpost to the unknown future, that destroyer of what was once certain), where the country mouse meets the town mouse, where African Oliver meets the African Artful Dodger and takes on a whole new way of thinking.

GREAT PICTURES, BAD WRITING

I've noticed in big photo books like this that the loveliness of the images is offset by the wretchedness of the prose which is added in the form of introductions and essays tacked on at the end. These are written either by the photographer or more often by some mates, who are universally sycophantic about the photographer and write about him like he was the second coming of Picasso. And at the drop of a zebra they start up with the New Age vapourising, like this :

Talent intuits that one can absorb the "other" without losing a sense of oneself; to dedicate oneself to work with constant care in order to better understand assures us of salvation.

Or

The word is a force. But if it is, it is because it created a bond between coming and going, a generator of life and action; however, so that the word can produce its full effect , it must be rhythmically scanned because movement has need of rhythm which, itself, is based on the secret of numbers.

That's from this book, but it could be from any of the others too.

Well - enough grouching - fabulous book !