By Ogova Ondego
Published October 11, 2021
The winners of the annual Wiki Loves Africa’s Photo Competition on Wikipedia have been announced.
In first position is Crazy Love by Ewien van Bergeijk-Kwant followed by Malaria Microscopy Training by Ozavogu Abdulsalam Khalid and Pupil by Gabriel Joe Amuzu in second and third places, respectively.
While Crazy Love, that wins US$1000 is the image of a mother taking care of her son in a hospital ward in a West African country and Malaria Microscopy Training (winner of US$800) is taken at the eHealth Africa Clinic in Nigeria after a training session, Pupil (winner of US$500) is an image of a primary school learner in school uniform washing her hands in Ghana.
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The Traditional Culture or Practice Prize has gone to Oldest Healing Dance by Kgara Kevin Rack of South Africa just as the Best Video Prize has been snapped up by Santé et Bien-être by Sboubacar Kamaté.
Santé et Bien-être, the winning video that is said to have been chosen by the Wiki Loves Africa competition organisers for its ‘quality imagery and the simple, contemporary way of displaying health and wellness’, follows a daily exercise routine through the streets of Abidjan in Ivory Coast.
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The organisers of the competition say they have given a Special Collection prize (US$500) to a series of images from Max Mbakop, Happi Raphael and Destiny Deffo, ‘three photographers who together collated an exceptional photo essay depicting the everyday professional and personal experiences at the Laquintinie Hospital in Douala’ (Cameroon) during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Every year, Wiki Loves Africa provides a platform for thousands of Africa’s photographers to take back the visual narrative by celebrating Africa’s cultural diversity and contemporary reality on Wikipedia,” Wiki In Africa, the organisers of the Wiki Loves Africa competition, say. “This year the competition coincides with the 20 year birthday celebrations of Wikipedia and ran from the 15th February to 30th April 2021.”
In 2021, the organisers say, the Wiki Loves Africa competition called for photographers to contribute images that interrogate the theme of Health + Wellness within the African context.
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With 2020 filled with sickness, illness and loss, Wiki in Africa says the theme of Health + Wellness for the 2021 competition was chosen by Africa’s Wikipedia community.
Van Bergeijk-Kwant, whose Crazy Love has taken the topmost prize, says of her image: “This image of a mum spending days faithfully sitting next to her very sick son – day in day out – just hit me. She had a certain calm and determination to her. Despite life being hard in West-Africa, she envisioned a certain dignity and hope I could not take my eyes off.”
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Dr Nirmal Ravi who works at the eHealth Africa where the second prize-winning photo was taken, says, “The photo captures the enthusiasm for learning that I frequently see in Nigerians. They have to overcome challenges that we don’t face in high income countries, such as unreliable electricity, unreliable transportation, stifling bureaucracy, slow or absent internet, and inadequate child care as with this laboratorian. She beautifully demonstrates her resolve and ingenuity by bringing her young baby along to our free malaria microscopy training.”
Gabriel Joe Amuzu, whose Pupil emerged third best image, says: “Seeing the little girl washing her hands in this COVID-19 era without anybody telling her to do so just made me understand how determined the girl is to live in this COVID -19 pandemic. And to not keep that action for myself alone, I took a picture of it to show to the rest of the world, so that we will all appreciate the life we are living, so we don’t die out of our recklessness. We should be willing to live a healthy life; a longer Life.”
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“I have a strong belief that all our answers lie in the natural world, including healing, from which we copy most of our philosophy, engineering, science and medicine,” says Kgara Kevin Rack, a trainee Igqirha (African Traditional Medicine) from South Africa whose photo won the Traditional Culture or Practice Prize. “We are the hollow bone or channel for the spirit and ancestors that facilitates the healing forces that lie within each of us. … I have felt the power of the San Trance Healing Dance, the healing of plants and this is why I submitted this image. Traditional medicine is the foundation of modern medicine.”
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Isla Haddow-Flood, co-organiser and Jury facilitator, says: “Almost every one of the 8,319 images and 56 video files that were contributed by 1,149 photographers displays an incredible range of those precious moments that add to the delicate complexity and universal experience of living – from heartbreaking pain to unfettered joy, from stoic determination to unrelenting hope, and from the necessity for sterile, clinical procedures to the wonder of a newborn’s very first breath. As a collection, it is an exhaustive expression of what it is to be human, all set against myriad African backdrops.”
