Africa Junctions
Lard Buurman
12 April – 3 May 2014

In spring 2014, Looiersgracht 60 in co-operation with Stedelijk Museum Bureau Amsterdam (SMBA), presented Africa Junctions. The solo exhibition displayed 32 new works by Lard Buurman (born 1969). Africa Junctions was the culmination of a photographic project which Buurman began in the spring of 2008 and pursued over the course of six years, in 14 cities in 12 different countries on the African continent. Looiersgracht 60 and SMBA choose to work with Buurman expressly for the depth of understanding and contemporary view of African cities which his work affords. Surpassing the prejudice which so often dominates Western understandings and representations of non-Western places, Buurman’s images display a unique sensibility and respect for these cities that function, albeit in ways not immediately apparent to a foreign observer.

Buurman’s work is at the interface between architectural and documentary photography. His process consists of taking multiple shots from the same vantage point which are then digitally spliced and reassembled to create a single image. Buurman’s photographs show the African city as places of movement, permanent change and incessant encounter. Buurman carefully choreographs human bodies in his constructed cityscapes and his crisp, polished aesthetic seeks to invite the viewer to question the veracity of documentary photography. He both captures and constructs his images acting as both documentary photographer and director of the scenes he produces. This results in work that is a hybrid of documentary and staged photography. Rather than portraying the reality of a single moment, Buurman’s work seeks to capture the everyday realities of a place, its people, their lives and their use of public spaces.

In conjunction with the exhibition, the book Africa Junctions. Capturing the City was launched which, illustrated with 80 of Buurman’s photographs, reflected on the images and the African city from a variety of perspectives. The exhibition went on to be shown at the Goethe Institute in Johannesburg (May 25 - June 7 2014) where it received acclaim from local critics who were impressed that a non-African could show such understanding for Africa, its subtleties and complexities. Buurman’s work represents African cities not as places of dysfunction and overflow but as spaces that work outside of Western definitions. In Buurmans images the cities have their own ways of functioning which hinge on fluidity, energy, movement, improvisation and ingenuity.