Ayo Adewunmi (Ph.D), Photographer/Painter, has taught art and photography at the Institute of Management and Technology (IMT), Enugu since 1991. He studied art at Ahmadu Bello University Zaria, Nigeria, where he obtained a BA in Industrial Design, in 1991. He has MFA in Painting and Ph.D in Art History, with a focus on Photography history, from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria. He is currently the Art Director of Life in My City Art Festival, (www.lifeinmycityartsfestival.org). He initiated the Art is Everywhere (AIE) project, a waste-to-art recycling workshop in 2005 (www.art-is-evrywhere.com.ng). Adewunmi has participated in numerous conferences and art exhibitions around the world, including in Nigeria, the UK, the US, Japan, Ghana, and Senegal.
Functional Significance of Photography in Central Nigeria, 1950 – 1980
Visual Presentation
Primarily, photography performs documentary, aesthetic, economic, and social functions. Between 1950 and 1980, photography played important roles and performed unique functions, in Central Nigeria. Some of these functions directly or indirectly affected society and were advantageous, in some cases, to the photographers. At that period, Photography was a means of economic emancipation, it was a job and creative engagement. To the clients and the society at large, photography played significant functions in Central Nigeria between 1950 and 1980. The functional significance of photography bordered on its contribution to the economic, historical, aesthetic, and social development of the region. The paper discusses these roles and their effect on the social economic development of the area. It analyses the emotional significance of photography products. The scope of the study is limited to notable functions within selected locations in Central Nigeria.