Africa Books

On This Earth: Photographs from East Africa

Nick Brandt

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 34 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Amazing BW pictures. Very nice 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 2 people found this review helpful.

Amazing BW pictures. Very nice and a good edition. Very interesting for all photo-africa lovers....

On This Earth 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

This is a wonderful book with some great pictures of the African wildlife. The black and white photos were striking and the book appeals to 3 years of age to 65. It captured the African wildlife that I have had the privilege of seeing first hand on two occasions.

Editorial Review:

Nick Brandt depicts the animals of East Africa with an intimacy and artistry unmatched by other photographers who choose wildlife as their subject. He creates these majestic sepia and blue-tone photos contrasting moments of quintessential stillness with bursts of dramatic action by engaging with these creatures on an exceptionally intimate level, without the customary use of a telephoto lens. Evocative of classical art, from dignified portraits to sweeping natural tableaux, Brandt's images artfully and simply capture animals in their natural states of being. With a foreword by Alice Sebold and an introduction by Jane Goodall, On This Earth is a gorgeous portfolio of some of the last wild animals and a heartfelt elegy to a vanishing world.

African Air

George Steinmetz

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Editorial Review:

Flying hundreds, sometimes thousands, of feet above ground strapped into a motorized paraglider that is little more than a parachute with a small motor, National Geographic photographer George Steinmetz has spent more than twenty years photographing some of the most remote and spectacular environments around the world. In African Air, Steinmetz captures stunning panoramas in more than fourteen countries in Africa, giving readers captivating and intimate views of areas that have rarely, if ever before, been photographed.

From densely packed urban centers to small, remote villages, from migrating herds of wildebeests and elephants to infinite miles of desert, African Air is a compelling testament and celebration of the majesty and splendor of Africa’s most breathtaking landscapes. With extraordinary vision and a unique perspective, Steinmetz portrays sky, land, and water in ways that have never been expressed before.

Africa

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Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Eye on Africa: Thirty years of Africa images, selected by Salgado himself Sebasti?o Salgado is one the most respected photojournalists working today, his reputation forged by decades of dedication and powerful black and white images of dispossessed and distressed people taken in places where most wouldn?t dare to go. Although he has photographed throughout South America and around the globe, his work most heavily concentrates on Africa, where he has shot more than 40 reportage works over a period of 30 years. From the Dinka tribes in Sudan and the Himba in Namibia to gorillas and volcanoes in the lakes region to displaced peoples throughout the continent, Salgado shows us all facets of African life today. Whether he's documenting refugees or vast landscapes, Salgado knows exactly how to grab the essence of a moment so that when one sees his images one is involuntarily drawn into them. His images artfully teach us the disastrous effects of war, poverty, disease, and hostile climatic conditions. This book brings together Salgado's photos of Africa in three parts. The first concentrates on the southern part of the continent (Mozambique, Malawi, Angola, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Namibia), the second on the Great Lakes region (Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya), and the third on the Sub-Saharan region (Burkina Faso, Mali, Sudan, Somalia, Chad, Mauritania, Senegal, Ethiopia). Texts are provided by renowned Mozambique novelist Mia Couto, who describes how today's Africa reflects the effects of colonization as well as the consequences of economic, social, and environmental crises. This stunning book is not only a sweeping document of Africa but an homage to the continent's history, people, and natural phenomena.

Natural Fashion: Tribal Decoration from Africa

Hans Silvester

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

An unprecedented series of images showing the Omo people's imaginative body decoration and embellishments.

The scene of tribal conflicts and guerrilla incursions, Ethiopia's Omo Valley is also home to fascinating rites and traditions that have survived for thousands of years. The nomadic peoples who inhabit this valley share a gift for body painting and elaborate adornments borrowed from nature, and Hans Silvester has captured the results in a series of photographs made over the course of numerous trips.

In this region of East Africa, the rivers that run through the dry savannas are home to abundant flowers, papyrus, and wild fruit trees, and this luxuriance becomes an invitation to creativity and spectacle. Within hand's reach, a multitude of plants inspire fanciful and ephemeral self-decoration, and the Omo react spontaneously: a leaf, root, seed pod, or flower is quickly transformed into an accessory. As in the West one might don a hat, people create caps from tufts of grass. As one would knot a tie or scarf, they ornament themselves with banana leaves or a stem laden with flowers. These decorations are embellished with butterfly wings, buffalo horns, boar's teeth, colorful feathers, and the like, and are further enhanced by body painting with pigments made from powdered stone, plants, berries, and river mud.

Here is a priceless record of a unique and increasingly fragile way of life, one threatened by conflict, climate change, and tourism. 160 color illustrations.

Curse Of The Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Curse of the Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta takes a graphic look at the profound cost of oil exploitation in West Africa. Featuring images by world-renowned photojournalist Ed Kashi and text by Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka, prominent Nigerian journalists, human rights activists, and University of California at Berkeley professor Michael Watts, this book traces the 50-year history of Nigeria’s oil interests and the resulting environmental degradation and community conflicts that have plagued the region.
Now one of the major suppliers of U.S. oil, Nigeria is the sixth largest producer of oil in the world. Set against a backdrop of what has been called the scramble for African oil, Curse of the Black Gold is the first book to document the consequences of a half-century of oil exploration and production in one of the world’s foremost centers of biodiversity. This book exposes the reality of oil’s impact and the absence of sustainable development in its wake, providing a compelling pictorial history of one of the world’s great deltaic areas. Accompanied by powerful writing by some of the most prominent public intellectuals and critics in contemporary Nigeria, Kashi’s photographs capture local leaders, armed militants, oil workers, and nameless villagers, all of whose fates are inextricably linked. His exclusive coverage bears witness to the ongoing struggles of local communities, illustrating the paradox of poverty in the midst of plenty.
The publication of Curse of the Black Gold occurs at a moment of worldwide concern over dependency on petroleum, dubbed by New York Times journalist Thomas Friedman as "the resource curse." Much has been written about the drama of the search for oil—Daniel Yergin’s The Prize and Ryszard Kapus´cin´ski’s Shah of Shahs are two of the most widely lauded—but there has been no serious examination of the relations between oil, environment, and community in a particular oil-producing region. Curse of the Black Gold is a landmark work of historic significance.

Faces of Africa

Carol Beckwith, Angela Fisher

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

A celebration in words and images 5 out of 5 stars.
11 of 12 people found this review helpful.

What a delight for the eyes this book is! I found myself drawn deeper and deeper into each photograph. The accompanying text is beautifully crafted and I almost want to commit each entry to memory. When I visited Africa, I instantly fell in love with its people, its landscapes and the authenticity of life on this breathtaking continent. This book allows me to marvel at, and to cherish, the traditions and rituals which frame the lives of the African people.

Editorial Review:

Following the critically-acclaimed landmark 2-volume African Ceremonies—for which they won a United Nations Award of Excellence—photographers Carol Beckwith and Angela Fisher have collaborated once again with Faces of Africa, an unparalleled collection of more than 120 photographs. Drawn from their work over the past thirty years, this book is an inclusive look at the people and cultures from across this broad continent.

With their unique eye for Africa and its inhabitants, Beckwith and Fisher have brought forth a masterpiece in the genre—and a moving, personal tribute to some of the most beautiful people on Earth.

The End of the Game: The Last Word from Paradise

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 13 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

The end of the big game - A book to protect today'swildlife 3 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

Published in 1965, the book is the most famous book of Peter Beard. The book is shoking as most photos are pictures of dead animals, it is definitely not a book to look at before your safari. Black and white pictures are excellent. Sadly, the last pages are only photos of elephant's carcasses (too much?). The Beard's touch is a book full of old illustration, tiny pics, small and odd drawings and detailed texts - most of them taken from the British Museum. The book is about the Old Africa and text about Mt Kenya, the Man-eaters of Tsavo, Nairobi and Karen Blixen are not easy and you must have a knowledge of Kenyan history to understand them fully. This book is essential for any African collection as it has shocked and marked history.

Old Africa brought to life 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

An excellent book for those that can handle the truth. It shows what will happen when nature is left to manage itself and what happens when men don't control themselves. It's about hard times and history-a way of life long forgotten. If you are a product of the spoonfed Disney age, then you'll find this book shocking. It may well be your first taste of truth about wild animals,wild places, and the true spirit of man. This book is about Old Africa and should not be judged with today's politically correct eye. It is an account of things happened in a forgotten time, and a lost way of life.

Editorial Review:

Researched, photographed, and compiled over 20 years, Beard's "End of the Game" tells the tale of the enterprisers, explorers, missionaries, and big-game hunters who changed the face of Africa in the 20th century.

Spirits of Tangier

Tessa Codrington

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Editorial Review:

The stunning photographs and evocative text in this volume capture the essence of Tangier life from the 1920s to the present day. Paul and Jane Bowles, the American painter Marguerite McBay, Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton, playwright Tennessee Williams, royal photographer Cecil Beaton, and the painters Claudio Bravo and Patrick Procktor are some of the legendary residents of this Moroccan port city portrayed in these reminiscences and candid portraits. Personal family photographs depict the extravagant parties hosted and attended by the author and her circle. The evolution of design and style in some of the great houses as they changed ownership is documented, demonstrating how the composition of life in this archetypal city unfolded throughout the 20th century.

Ethiopia: Peoples of the Omo Valley

Hans Silvester

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Superb! 5 out of 5 stars.
16 of 16 people found this review helpful.

I hated to shell out the big bucks, but I've hit rock bottom and I admit I'm a junkie for books on places where I've been in tribal Africa. So I had to do it--and I'm glad I did.

It's hard to imagine having any books at all on tribal life anywhere in the world and not have this two-volume set. The photography and its richness of color as printed on the page just can't be topped. Is it just me, or are more people "discovering" the Omo Valley these days? It's in southern Ethiopia, where people still live much as they have for centuries--they still compete against nature for sustenance, tribes still fight each other for grazing land, women still wear goat skins and the men of some tribes still consider the most minimal of clothing optional. It is one of the few places in the world where tribal attire and body painting is the real, every-day thing--not something put on for tourists. Silvester represents it well in this set. And unlike so many coffee table books, in which any kind of meaningful narrative is catch as catch can, Silvester's narrative is informative and engaging--more anecdotal than a scholarly treatise.

Good news: no thumbnails in the back, where you have to go for captions. Captions are with the pictures, but I wish more of the pictures were captioned.

I was apprehensive about the second volume. The editorial review can be interpreted as meaning photos of the body paintings have been turned into abstract art. I didn't really want to pay for something like that. But again, I wasn't disappointed. The second volume is just photos, not photos reworked into abstract art. The art on their bodies already is abstract art. I swear, I have seen far less impressive paintings hanging in art galleries, commanding many thousands of dollars! Page after page, you will say aloud, "This is amazing!"

Some will hate Silvester's work. As we've seen in other reviews of books covering tribal Africa, there will always be some who seem embarrassed by all the nudity. They will angrily denounce such books as somehow "false," claiming such Africa no longer exists. Weird wishful thinking, I suppose, probably having something to do with internalized racism. This 2-volume set, then, is not for them. This photographer does not select for publication only those shots where an elbow or a leaf just happens to shield the viewer from prudish sensitivities. And that gives you a sense of honesty about the work. You don't feel manipulated as you might if you felt the photographer had an agenda or was trying to be gentle with you. You don't have a vague sense of wondering what else he doesn't want you to know.

The lives and culture of the Omo Valley peoples are so different from ours in the West that we can find them shocking at first take. Sylvester addresses this. "When you see how these people live, you can't help asking: 'What is a savage?' What do we understand by the term 'primitive'?" I wouldn't have used the word "savage," not even in the context of the question, because it might imply the people really are more or less savage unless granted some kind of special, sympathetic interpretation of the depiction. I would not want to remotely suggest they could be seen as "savage." (Perhaps the translation from Silvester's German wasn't the best in this instance.) In any case, once you spend time with these people--in his case, I think it was 9 trips over 3 years--the mystery and the oddities quickly become not so odd or mysterious. Should the photographer, then, produce a work that carefully considers Western unfamiliarity and shock, or a work that caters more to authenticity? He goes for the authentic.

Check out Giansanti's work, and Beckwith & Fisher. Those are great too. But don't come up short without this one, either. It will take you on a wonderful, close-up journey into the harsh but beautiful land, and the hard but beautiful lives of the people of the Omo Valley.

Editorial Review:

In this ambitious work, Hans Silvester turns his photographic eye toward ancient Africa, the birthplace of humanity. Silvester was essentially adopted by his subjects during his travels, and his stunning color photographs present a rare, intimate view of their world.

The first volume of this deluxe two-volume set presents the everyday lives of the Omo people, their rituals, parades, children’s games, and even their battles. In the second volume, each photograph becomes a masterpiece of abstract art, revealing close-ups of the tribes’ traditional body paintings. Silvester’s accompanying text traces his journey to the Horn of Africa, revealing the fascinating beauty of a world now in danger of extinction.

Beaufort West

Mikhael Subotzky

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Editorial Review:

At the halfway point along South Africa's great highway-the N1, running from Cape Town to Johannesburg-lies the small town of Beaufort West. With a prison in the middle of town on an island in the highway, it's a surreal road stop that offers everything a traveler might want: food, gas, a place to stay, an hour of sex. Its vivid characters and poignant social landscapes are the subject of Mikhael Subotzky's first photobook. Exquisitely designed and produced on a large portfolio scale, Beaufort West features thirty-six plates and an introduction by leading South African writer Jonny Steinberg. The book is both an important social document and the visual manifesto of the best of the new wave of South African art photographers.

Beaufort West will be exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, opening on September 10, 2008. It is Mikhael Subotzky's first US solo exhibition.

Mikhael Subotzky, born in Cape Town in 1981, began photographing the South African prison system while he was a student at the University of Cape Town. In his short career since then, he has come to be regarded as the most exciting photographer to emerge from South Africa and has won several of the world's major photography awards, including an ICP Infinity Award for Young Photographer of the Year in 2008. His photographs are collected by New York's Museum of Modern Art and the National Gallery of South Africa, and, at just twenty-five, he is the youngest member of the Magnum Photos cooperative.