Voices and Visions Photo Essay Competition
Voices and Visions
Black History Month 2025 Photo Essay Competition
The Chude Jideonwo Prize for Creativity 2025
Theme: VOICES & VISIONS
The Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa held its first ever Photo Essay Competition to celebrate this year's Black History Month.
Building on last years's published anthology, we invited PfAL students to tell their story through a photo essay, a combination of an image and words on the theme Voices & Visions.
The theme invites us to see and to hear differently. It is about amplifying the quiet voices that often go unheard and recognising the visions that shape how we live, dream, and imagine. We are searching for the extraordinary in everyday lives and the ordinary within moments that may seem extraordinary.
Winners
We're dleighted to announce that the winner of this year's competition was Benita Manzengo for her entry, entitled Black Men’s Joy.
"This photograph is an attempt at capturing the joy that is often missing in the media’s depiction of black men. It is to encourage us to use our vision and voices to write a different narrative about black men, one of humanity and of joy."
I have seen Black men before.
I have seen them everywhere, lately.
I have seen them in ways that swell the chest with pride in their victories, their brilliance, their becoming.
I have seen them trying to be what one shouldn’t.
I have seen them being everything one wishes.
I have seen them in ways one doesn’t want to.
I have seen them in ways one doesn’t forget.
Frankly, in the last few years, I have seen more than I wanted to.
I have held my breath through the nine minutes of George Floyd’s murder.
I have heard the guns that stole the voices of youthful Black men.
I have seen them shrink their shoulders to contain the neighbor’s fears.
I have seen them fight. I have seen them fall.
I have seen him- walking the halls of this house like a ghost.
But that day, under sunny Colorado skies and unforgiving winds that filled our mouths with sand,
I saw joy.
I saw a group of young Black men laughing and running up the steep side of dunes.
I saw them falling, sliding down the dune’s back, and running back up.
“Hold my hand, I will help you,” one offered, assuring the other there was nothing to fear.
I saw love in each of their steps.
So, I decided to capture it, to contribute differently to what we see of young Black men.
Images of Black men have long shaped movements for justice and rights.
But it is time we contribute to the narrative differently.
It is time we see humanity.
It is time we see joy.
Second prize went to Karabo Asala for their entry The Edge of Becoming.
"Standing at the edge of the Serengeti, I watch the sunset, which reminds me that life is both fleeting and infinite."
Having grown up in a small town near a mountainous and landlocked country, I have naturally always been drawn to horizons, curious about what lies beyond them. And here, overlooking the vastness of the Serengeti as I watch the sun dissolve into its endless plains, I am reminded that there is plenty of room to dream far beyond what my eyes can see.
My footsteps have carried me far from home, through the corridors of education, into classrooms buzzing with ideas and across continents, satiating my naturally inquisitive mind. Early in life, I watched people cross lines drawn by history, carrying more than clothes in their luggage: they carried hope. I, too, carried mine, a hunger for understanding how lives are shaped by power, places and possibility. As I navigate life now, even in the studies I am so passionate about, I think of the communities that raised me, whose realities ignite my purpose. I carry their stories with me, of struggle, of learning, of laughter and tears, and I carry them forward, into a future that is not yet written.
As I stand here, I am living in one of their answered prayers, reflecting every late night of study, every moment of doubt, every time I dared to dream bigger than my circumstances. This photograph may look still, but it is alive with a burning curiosity, much like that of the sun, about the places I am yet to go to, the people I am yet to meet, the things I am yet to do and the self I am still becoming. The sun will soon set, here. And I will wake up tomorrow and continue my journey to meet my future self.
Third prize went to Ruth Otim for Hoya Hoye! Observing Buhe in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 2025.
"Chanting ‘Hoya Hoye!’ in observance of Buhe, a feast day in the Ethiopian Orthodox Calendar, young Ethiopian boys sing and bring joy behind the doorway of a home in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia."
It’s almost poetic. As the Ethiopian Orthodox feast day of Buhe observes the Transfiguration of Christ on Mount Tabor, the occasion also marks the transition from the rainy to the dry season in Ethiopia, where sunshine blankets the highlands, and its warmth enters every home through young troubadours singing blessings for the coming year. Their makeshift instruments of sanded sticks and Coca-Cola caps give a rhythmic beat to their chant, ‘Hoya Hoye!’, as the lead singer – the boy with the strongest voice – ushers melodies filled with Ethiopian pride, prosperity for our communities, and joy.
I was delighted to see that the strongest singer was also the smallest, the boy in red. Before we could see them, we could hear his commanding voice as they approached our family home and embraced us with their boyish charm: this is the exact moment I was fortunate to capture. The boys' smiley entrance quite literally brought light into our home, almost as if they were the very sun that renews the seasons. I couldn’t help but smile and sing along: “Open the gates, O’ Lord,” “Open the gates, let the lion awake,” “Hoya Hoye,” “Hoya Hoye!”
The soundtrack to my return home for the summer is composed by them. Living in the Ethiopian diaspora means observing Buhe as something familiar yet distant. As I sang along, I simultaneously longed for the moment I was experiencing. It always feels remarkable to experience Buhe, as it’s one of the only holidays in the calendar inaugurated by the youngest members of our communities. And so, as they stand at the threshold of my family home, ancient poetry is harmonised by the youngest of voices, and they invert tradition: children become teachers, our culture’s youngest keepers, and I continue to learn our poetry and history through them.
The competition is run by the Programme for African Leadership in partnership with the LSE Student Union, LSE EmbRace, LSE ACS and the Africa Centre.
Prizes
- First Prize: £150 bookshop voucher
- Second Prize: £100 bookshop voucher
- Third Prize: £50 bookshop voucher