Mal d’Afrique the French call it- a disease of sorts, a deep longing to return back to the source of life; a difficult and challenging concept which can only be understood by those who have been blessed (or cursed) to experience it. Born and raised East African, I feel constantly pulled towards Africa, an almost visceral emotion which eats at me when I am away from home.
This work is an ongoing project dating back to 2004 when shooting film was still a thing and I was blessed to roam the savannah carefree. At the time I was a PhD student conducting ethnolinguistic fieldwork amongst a group of people known as the Hadzabe, Africa’s last true hunter-gatherers.
They live in the land surrounding Lake Eyasi in Northern Tanzania and exist in small groups pursuing a semi-nomadic lifestyle. Their culture is rich and complex and are they are known to be skilled, knowledgeable and imaginative. They obtain their food by hunting, exclusively with bow and arrow. They collect honey of wild bees and eat berries and fruits and a wide variety of vegetation and edible roots. They speak Hadzane, a language isolate, unrelated to any other with a rich consonant inventory that includes clicks and ejective stops, or pops. Despite their incredible resourcefulness, they find themselves facing a precarious future.
With this project I aim to bring across the tenacity and spirit of the Hadzabe and the respect and affection that I hold for them. Some of the people photographed here are no longer with us. May this also be a testament to the legacy that they leave behind and a beacon of hope for the future.