FREE ENTRY / InVision Africa 2023

InVision Africa is a photography project of the Alliance for African Partnership (AAP) and the African Studies Centre (ASC) at Michigan State University that seeks to showcase, inspire, and contribute to positive images of and stories about Africa in the context of research, innovation, and entrepreneurship. The project will be open to student photographers and students with an interest in photography from 10 African universities that are part of the AAP consortium. Students may collaborate with researchers at their universities to develop a photography project that is aligned to AAP research priority areas; or they may work on it alone. Projects will highlight research trends, innovation, and key developments in science, entrepreneurship, and arts and culture. The goal is to inspire creative engagement between research/science and culture and art.

Negative images and media stories about Africa have dominated and defined the global media space for a prolonged period, particularly in the Global North. This perpetuates and entrenches stereotypes about Africans in the Global North while overlooking and negating the positive realities of the people, communities, and countries on the continent. This project will raise awareness about the contributions to global research/science, innovation, entrepreneurship, and arts and culture that Africans are making every day. In addition to educating and raising awareness, the InVision Africa project seeks to inspire and promote creative engagement between research/science and art. Most importantly, the project seeks to improve research images that are often homogenous and not engaging. These images tend to feature workshops, meetings, group photos, and people selling food in marketplaces, further underrepresenting the depth, breadth, and complexity of the innovation, entrepreneurship, research, science, and technology taking place on the continent. Additionally, the continent's youth population is participating in the global economy in creative, innovative, and ground-breaking ways, and it is critically important to highlight this through images. Most importantly, InVision Africa provides an opportunity for youth to showcase their talents and engage with researchers and scientists in a world where trends, content creation, and information define entrepreneurship.