josef chladek

on photobooks and books

Pieter Hugo - The Hyena & Other Men, Prestel, 2007, München

Hardcover with dust jacket.

Many myths surround the Hyena Men who haunt the peripheries of Nigeria's cities. Accompanied by hyenas, rock pythons and baboons, these men earn a living by performing before crowds and selling traditional medicines. Pieter Hugo's extraordinary portraits of their liminal existence reveal an uncanny world of complex, codependent relationships, where familiar distinctions between dominance and submission, wildness and domesticity, tradition and modernity are constantly subverted.

"When South African photographer Pieter Hugo, who is white, photographed itinerant Nigerian entertainers in The Hyena & Other Men (2007), questions were raised about exotic voyeurism and exploiting the 'other'" the authors observe. "Yet when it comes to the issue of identity in photography, point of view matters more than ever. Hugo was acutely aware of this question, and was scrupulous in the way he went about photographing the 'Hyena men', making the photographs as neutral as possible and giving his subjects a textual voice that describes their social invisibility in their own country." (from The Photobook: A History Volume III)

Pages: 80
Place: München
Year: 2007
Publisher: Prestel
Size: 25 x 29 cm (approx.)