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From Trans-Africa, Invisible Borders group moves across Nigeria

By Margaret Mwantok
08 June 2016   |   2:20 am
The road trip began in Lagos on May 12, and would continue through June 26.
Invisible Borders group

Invisible Borders group

A group of trans-border photographers and writers known as Invisible Borders will uplift the diversity of Nigeria with the 6th edition of their road trip. The travellers revealed to journalists recently that their aim was to underscore the borders that are both inscribed and elusive within the country. The nine-man team comprises of four photographers, three writers, a project manager and a head of communications.

The road trip began in Lagos on May 12, and would continue through June 26.

Over the past five years, the Invisible Borders Trans-African Project has focused on promoting African exchange across countries, through various artistic interventions of which, the most prominent is the Trans-African Road Trips. The last edition was the 141-day road trip from Lagos to Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

This year, the team focuses on the borders within Nigeria. They would travel by road across 14 states, making about 15 stops in cities across all the regions of the country. Photographers, filmmakers and writers invited to participate in the six-week road trip will undertake to produce images and texts that reflect impressionistic, yet critical readings of contemporary Nigeria.

Participants would reflect on questions such as: Who am I in relation to Nigeria, as we know it? How am I a product of what I have been inevitably named? How do I interact across the several visible and invisible borders I confront as a Nigerian? While the artists are expected to employ a subjective gaze to the exploration of these questions, their work will focus primarily on reflecting the voices of individuals – the average Nigerian.

According to the founder of Invisible Borders, Emeka Okereke, who is also a participant (filmmaker and photographer), “What is foremost is the encounters, we shall meet, converse, dine, play and live with Nigerians from all walks of life, with hope that the works produced eventually will be precipitates of those encounters. The physicality of the geographical enclave is equally of importance – a space, an environment is always a reflection of the people therein.”

He continued, “In addition, Invisible Borders will present several short, personal, narratives by residents of the towns and cities en-route, with the aim of creating a crowd-sourced narrative of contemporary Nigeria. The narratives, combined, will be made into a lengthy documentary film. Loose and non-linear, the film will underscore the improbability of reducing Nigeria to a single voice, or way of telling.”

The travellers intend to go to Kano, Maiduguri, Yola, Katsina, Calabar, Aba, Umuahia, Enugu, Port Harcourt, Asaba, Warri, Benin, Lokaja, Osogbo, Abeokuta and Lagos.

To the participants, it would be a great opportunity to visit parts of Nigeria they never thought of going to, as there was no better way to experience life than to see how other people live theirs. They also shared their fears to include; “coming back alive, will I be remembered for an impact made? Can I achieve all that I have set out to do?”

The participants are Zaynab O. Odunsi, a Saudi-based Nigerian photographer, who works as a full-time lecturer at Dar Al Hekma University, Jeddah. Emeka Okereke, a Nigerian photographer who lives and works between Africa and Europe, moving from one to the other on a frequent basis. Uche Okonkwo, a writer and editor, with an MA in Creative Writing from the Centre for New Writing. Yinka Elujoba studied Engineering at Obafemi Awolowo University and finished in 2014.

In 2010, he won the EditRed Poetry Challenge. Yagazie Emezi, a multi-disciplinary artist and photographer based in Lagos, Nigeria. She studied Cultural Anthropology and African Studies in the United States. Emmanuel Iduma is a writer and art critic. He is the author of the novel Farad and co-editor of Gambit: Newer African Writing. Eloghosa Osunde is a writer and photographer who lives in and works from Lagos. Her work in photography and writing is a constant attempt to gain insight into social and personal complexities.

Innocent is an amateur photographer, a content developer and project manager with a Bachelor’s degree in English from Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria. Ellen Kondowe is a Malawian-South African, born in 1992, a Fashion graduate of Spero Villiioti Elite Design in Johannesburg, South Africa, whilst at SVEDA, she completed the Parsons New School of Design.

Okereke also expressed gratitude to the sponsors of the trip, it is the first time we are having exclusive sponsors within Nigeria, Diamond Bank, Peugeot Automobile Nigeria and Nikon Nigeria,” he said.

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