Photographer Samuel Fosso was born in Cameroon in 1962, Fosso lived in Nigeria was a young child, but was then forced to over to Bangui in the Central Africa Republic at the end of the Biafran war. In Bangui, he worked as a assistant photographer and at the age of 13, opened his own photographic studio. He began to experiment further into the art of photography. His work is like one of my favourite photographers Cindy Sherman. Both photographers are the subjects and producers of the photographs.
‘African Spirits Samuel Fosso’is an interesting piece which presents the basic figures of African independence and the Civil Rights Movement or Black cultural monuments.The exhibition features Samuel Fosso as Kwame Nkrumah, Malcom X, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Senghor, Aimé Césaire, Miles Davis, Seydou Keita, Angela Davis, N’Krumah, Lumumba, Tommie Smith, Haïlé Sélassié, and Muhammad Ali.
“…As in all my works, I am both character and director. I don’t put myself in the photographs: my work is based on specific situations and people I am familiar with, things I desire, rework in my imagination and afterward, I interpret. I borrow an identity. In order top succeed I immerse myself in the necessary physical and mental state. It’s a way of freeing me from myself. A solitary path. I am a solitary man.”
– Samuel Fosso (JEAN MARC PATRAS)
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