Tam Fiofori: Telling Nigeria’s story in pictures
A unique feature of your works is that they are in black and white predominantly. Why is that? Black and white photography is more challenging. The beauty of black and white photography is to be able to achieve the spectrum of tones between pure white and pure black, by showing the many tones of grey […]
A unique feature of your works is that they are in black and white predominantly. Why is that?
Black and white photography is more challenging. The beauty of black and white photography is to be able to achieve the spectrum of tones between pure white and pure black, by showing the many tones of grey in-between. These photographs were taken on celluloid film and analogue cameras in the late seventies and early eighties. I have been in photography for four decades and I usually shoot black and white, colour transparencies and colour negative films more recently. My emphasis now is to exhibit my archival photographs as I work towards the publication of my photography books.
How did you get into photography?
My interest in photography is to train my eye properly and to use the camera as a mechanical eye to capture unusual things and, things and objects from unusual perspectives and things that people overlook, ignore and take for granted. I direct people’s attention to these things using my camera and film.
What exactly is your interest in photography? The camera itself or the images you capture or some other things?
Photographers are like fishermen in that you will always remember the shots you missed, the shots you were too slow to catch; just like fishermen always remember the fish that got away. Missed shots haunt you for a while, but then you move on. They also pose a future challenge and, with experience and alertness you will know just when to take the photograph. It is this right timing that distinguishes great photographs from snapshots. The aim of every photographer is to shoot a great photograph!
I used to move around with at least two cameras on me; one loaded with black and white film and the other with colour film. Some images are better in black and white while others are better in colour. This was my habit moving around Nigeria until the late eighties when it became unsafe because of thieves and area boys. Generally, I find that there is now more aggression towards cameras and photographers on the streets.
Does photography best express your thoughts and desires?
Photography is part of my creative expression and my career. I am basically a documentary photographer and I document events from sports to socio-political activities as they happen. I don’t pose people or events. Also, most of my work is based on things that attract my creative fancy and events that will surely have historic and cultural value in the future. Naturally, this means I fully sponsor myself to cover these events in Nigeria, Europe and other parts of Africa.
What influences your decisions on photography scenes?
I tend to do documentary studies. Every event has its creative merits and challenges. The coronation ceremonies of the Oba of Benin go on for days and feature a lot of historic and cultural activities. The Argungu fishing festival, the 1978 and 1980 Football Cup of Nations in Ghana and Nigeria respectively, the World Athletics Championships in Finland in 1983, the All-Africa Games in Kenya, Pope John Paul’s visit are all equally exciting to shoot as they have a wealth of images. Then capturing a woman as she paddles her canoe in the creeks or children playing bicycle polo are as fulfilling as politicians on the campaign trail. These assignments can also be equally difficult if you lose your concentration and focus. You also require patience and good positioning to get unique photographs.
Are there times you have seen interesting shots but have missed them because you didn’t have your camera on you or for some other reason?
I don’t do any particular shot over and over again, because I mostly shoot live action. I am not a studio photographer. I cannot ask the Oba or Pope or Shagari to stop in the middle of a ceremony so I have trained myself to anticipate and get the photograph I want.
I let my photographs speak for themselves. I take photographs that have levels of meaning and messages so that the more the viewer looks at them he or she discovers and appreciates many more things. Like you notice the motion, gestures and rhythms of dancers, musicians and spectators’ reactions all in one photograph.
You are better known for your photography than your filmmaking side. What has happened to the filmmaking side of you?
I still make documentary films. My documentary film on Pope John Paul’s visit in 1998 is similar technically and creatively to shooting documentary photographs of the Oba of Benin’s coronation in 1979. A film is made up of thousands of single photographs!
How were you able to take so many political photographs in those days?
I covered the rallies on my own because as a documentary photographer I felt that the return to democracy was very important. So I did not need invitations to attend the rallies. It was a part of my role in social responsibility and professional duty.
How do you evaluate Nigeria’s perception of photography as an art?
Nigerians are gradually beginning to appreciate photography as creative art. Exhibitions are helping to change public perception of photography and more people are becoming conscious of the creative work involved in good photography. This is very encouraging!
You have an ongoing exhibition in which you are showing only 1979 shots of your works. Is 1979 the most significant year in your career?
1979 was a very special year for me photographically. The previous year, 1978 had been quite busy and preparatory in honing my photography skills and direction and, the results are evident in the thirty photographs on exhibition. Essentially, ‘1979: A Peep into History and Culture’ is an exhibition of thirty photographs taken thirty years ago when I was in my thirties.
The photographs in ‘1979: A Peep into History and Culture’ are therefore also a study of the motions, movements and rhythms of the diverse events they document. In this exhibition are documentary photographic images of the important events I covered in 1979. These are the coronation of the 38th Oba of the Benin Kingdom in March, the true heavyweights of Nigerian politics, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Alhaji Shehu Shagari and Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe on the presidential campaign trail, and festivities during a house opening/warming ceremony in Ijebu Igbo.
This exhibition is not supposed to be a definitive visual coverage of the year 1979. However, I believe that this ‘reel of images’ successfully gives us an important and vital peep into the history and culture of Nigeria in 1979.
In trying to observe or pay attention to things are you able to tell the story of what you see or your opinions in the images you capture?
During the All-Africa Games, I made friends with a Japanese photographer Kobayasi based in Kenya, who remarked that, “the world is not interested in excuses, only results!” This observation was equally true for the sportsmen and women as well as photographers then, and now.
In the various sports disciplines diverse body motions, movements and rhythms were employed by the sportsmen and women. These ‘techniques’ in turn sharpened my instincts and ‘view’ as well as encouraged me to investigate different photographic angles and positions. Getting the image of a long jumper at his/her highest elevation from a low camera angle, a goalkeeper making an acrobatic save, a swimmer doing the butterfly stroke, a hurdler in flight and a cyclist speeding across the lens, posed challenges in capturing the fleeting moment that told the whole story of the motions, movements and rhythms involved in the sporting process. Most importantly, I was not using a motor drive and had to shoot single frames; which made my anticipatory instincts and ‘moment of decision’ very critical.
Being that I am a full-frame, natural/available light photographer; working in these catch-as-catch-can situations where I had to quickly adjust and respond to events as they unfolded totally beyond my control, I had to ‘learn’ fast and ensure that I came away with good and spectacular photographic images; more so as I fully sponsored all the expenses to cover these events across the continent. I could not afford to lose money or come away with bad and substandard photographic images.
What influences your decisions on photography scenes?
In covering major and multi-disciplinary events like the Africa Cup of Nations in Accra and Kumasi, Ghana, the All-Africa Games in Algiers, Algeria, and the All-Africa University Games in Nairobi, Kenya; all in 1978, I was forced to be more alert photographically, to sharpen my ‘eye’, to intuitively anticipate actions and movements, to closely observe how motion and rhythm shaped events and results, to better understand the properties of the various types/speeds of black and white 35mm celluloid films I was using and, appreciate much better the qualities of natural light at different times of the day.