Angèle Etoundi Etoundi Essamba

Angèle Etoundi Essamba (Cameroon, 1962) photographs African women in their connection with the earth. Nature is not only an important theme, but also objects from African culture. Essamba moved to Paris at the age of ten, where she studied philosophy and dance. Later, she moved to the Netherlands to study photography at the Fotovakschool in Apeldoorn. The consciously calculated, yet simultaneously invisible mystery that Angèle Etoundi Essamba reveals in her photography is the outer layer, behind which the essence lies hidden, withdrawn from view but nevertheless distinctly present. Her photographs are not meant to conceal but to make visible. Angèle Etoundi Essamba continuously references African culture, particularly Cameroon, where she was born and lived for the first ten years of her life. Through this, she gives direction to the mystery in her photographs. What we see are symbols of communication between people, symbols of pride, willpower, and the (self) awareness of women, symbols of our connection to the earth, and symbols of the relationship between the inner and outer self of humanity. In her photographs, Angèle Etoundi Essamba has captured human energy at the 'moment suprême' and frozen time. However, these are not static images; they have too great a presence for that. They are penetrating photographs, perhaps even appearing distant and unattainable at first glance. Although it is immediately clear that each photo contains a world of its own, no single image reveals its secret outright. It is no coincidence that Angèle Etoundi Essamba also writes poetry. A poem, like a photograph, is usually not fully understood at once. A good poem gradually reveals its true content through reading and rereading.