Akinbode Akinbiyi (born 1946 inOxford, England) is a British photographer, author and curator ofNigerian background, who has been living inBerlin, Germany, since the 1990s. Due to his participation in exhibitions, festivals, publications and networks, he has become known as one of the internationally renowned representatives of photography in Africa.
Akinbiyi grew up in England, where his parents had moved for university studies, and inLagos, Nigeria. He studiedEnglish literature inIbadan,Lancaster andHeidelberg.[1]
In 1972, he began as aself-taught photographer. Over time, Akinbiyi became one of the internationally recognized photographers of African origin. His main focus is on the rapidly growing and changingmegacities of the African continent, such as Lagos,Kinshasa,Cairo,Dakar andJohannesburg.[2] In doing so, he concentrates on the unspectacular everyday life of people, seemingly without subjective interpretation of the objects of his pictures.
Working mainly with an analogueRolleiflexmedium format camera, Akinbiyi's personal style ofstreet photography was described by art curatorBonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung:[3]
"Akinbiyi studies social structures, uncovers the hidden, and makes visible the unseen. On the one hand, it is the temporal rhythm of urban and rural lives that is of interest to him and, on the other, the way the architecture and the flow of the city influences those lives."
As author, Akinbiyi has written texts for exhibition catalogues and for the book "Just Ask!" on contemporary African photography, edited by curatorSimon Njami.[4] In cooperation with theGoethe-Institut, the German cultural institute in Nigeria, he founded an art centre, which has since developed into a network of African photography schools.[5] Together with Gisela Kayser, he curated the photography exhibitions "Things Fall Apart - Film Stills byStephen Goldblatt"[6][7] and "The Respectful Gaze - From the Estate of Nina Fischer-Stephan,"[8][9] which were presented inLagos,Kampala,Mexico City,Accra,Abidjan andAtlanta. The short documentaryNina Fischer-Stephan's Respectful Gaze by Mallam Mudi Yahaya, who has also written extensive captions for exhibited photographs, explored the nexus of photography, architecture, and urban development, delving into the cultural and political implications of colonial and post-independence images of Africa. The film celebrated its world premiere in 2024 at theAfrican Film Festival inNew York.
Akinbiyi's work has been shown at exhibitions and biennials in Frankfurt, Berlin, Dresden, Tokyo, Paris, Philadelphia, Johannesburg and Havana, and has been published in various magazines. In addition, he acted as exhibition curator for the German Institute for Foreign Cultural Relations, including "STADTanSICHTEN Lagos" (2004) and "Spot on... DAK'ART – The 8th Biennial of Contemporary African Art" (2009). For theAfrican Photography Encounters in Mali, he curated the German contribution in 2003. As part ofdocumenta 14 art exhibition in 2017, he exhibited his work titledPassageways, Involuntary Narratives, and theSound of Crowded Spaces (2015–2017) inAthens,Greece, andKassel, Germany.[10] In connection with the New Photography 2023 exhibition at theMuseum of Modern Art (MOMA), Akinbiyi hosted a so-called "Photo-Wander" (a pun on wonder and wander) inHarlem, where he applied his method of strolling around the city.[11]
Akinbiyi has lived in Berlin since the early 1990s, where he has also exhibited his photographs of the African community and the city's colonial history, and has frequently returned to cities in Africa.[12]
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