Bamako Encounters. Kiripi Katembo & Abdoulaye Barry

This summer, the Royal Museum for Central Africa will showcase the work of two photographers whose monographs were part of the 9th edition of the Bamako Encounters.

This African photography biennial will pay a visit to Brussels as part of the Summer of Photography 2012. The country's leading photography museums and institutions will participate in this major festival on creative photography, organised by BOZAR. Kiripi Katembo's Un Regard and Abdoulaye Barry's Pêcheurs de nuit will be exhibited at the RMCA from 14 June to 26 August 2012.

"Un Regard" by Kiripi Katembo

The Un regard series by Kiripi Katembo includes 19 images taken when the streets of Kinshasa were flooded. The images are the reflection, mirrored by puddles of water, of a city where people, buildings, cars, mosquitoes, and rubbish live side by side. Katembo has managed to create a surprisingly poetic world this way, and his photos are a plea for a clean and healthy environment.

"Pêcheurs de nuit" by Abdoulaye Barry

The 25 photographs of Abdoulaye Barry's Pêcheurs de nuit are portraits of people whose livelihoods depend on fishing on the banks of Lake Chad. These nighttime shots bear silent testimony to the fragile existence of the fisherfolk and the threat to their surroundings, as well as the way by which they can continue to live in dignity within a protected natural environment.