‘The Future is Blinking: Early Studio Photography from West and Central Africa’ is currently on view at Museum Rietberg, Zurich. The exhibition focuses on the work of the earliest local photographers working in West and Central Africa. Towards the end of the 19th century, together with their clients, they began to produce captivating images in outdoor studios. Future viewers of their images were always kept in mind; the sitters posed as they wanted to be seen by posterity. These images are remarkably different from the work of colonial photographers whose work served to confirm the “Other” as backward and exotic. @shonibarestudio’s ‘Planets in My Head, Young Photographer’, 2019 is featured alongside one hundred original prints by African photographers. The exhibition considers the key themes in the history of photography in West and Central Africa with a focus on its peculiarities and its connections with other local art forms. The show is on view until 3 July. To find out more, please visit rietberg.ch. Image: Installation view, ‘The Future is Blinking: Early Studio Photography from West and Central Africa’, Museum Rietberg, Zurich, 18 March – 3 July 2022. Courtesy Museum Rietberg, Zurich. Photographer: Rainer Wolfsberger. @museumrietberg @goodman_gallery @nicolaernicollection