Art and the Artist: Aida Muluneh: Capturing the Essence of Life, Beauty and Time with her Eyes

Picture courtesy of Tadias magazine

'I am a believer that it is not the camera, it is your EYES' 

                                                                                         Aida Muluneh

Photography is not considered a profession in Ethiopia unless you have a studio at some corner. Even then, people recognize the studio but not the man behind the lens. Till recent years, there wasn't any photography school in the country or Ethiopian names that stand out when one talks about the art. 

Aida Muluneh is a pioneer in her field as an Ethiopian. Based in Addis Abeba, Ethiopia, Aida has broken all possible stereotypes and barriers set by the society, and continue to do so with her works and her foundation D.E.S.T.A (stands for Developing and Educating Society Through Art) For Africa. She is a woman, a photographer, a film maker,  and an activist in her own league ... that is a quadruple baaammm for you right there. I am a huge fan of hers and could go on and on how amazing she is but to save you from my overly excited chatter, Here is a little collage of some of my favorites from her work  and  a small excerpt on her biography according to Creative Africa Network.... and I will just let you be the judge.

Collage of some of my absolute favorite works of Aida.
 All Copyrights reserved to photographer Aida Muluneh.

"Born in Ethiopia in 1974, Aïda left the country at a young age and spent an itinerant childhood between Yemen and England. After several years in a boarding school in Cyprus, she finally settled in Canada in 1985. After studying film at Howard University in Washington, D.C., she went on to work as a freelance photographer for The Washington Post. Then in 2003, Aïda was chosen to be part of the groundbreaking show "Ethiopian Passages: Dialogues in the Diaspora" at the Smithsonian's National Museum of African Art in Washington, D.C. Later that same year, she made an appearance in “Imágenes Havana,” a group photography exhibition in Havana, Cuba, that led to her directing "The Unhealing Wound, a documentary about Ethiopian children who were sent to Cuba on an education scholarship but became abandoned for over twenty years.

  Aïda is also the founder of D.E.S.T.A FOR AFRICA, a non-profit cultural organization in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. D.E.S.T.A FOR AFRICA stands for Developing and Educating Socity Through Art. It also means "happiness" in the Ethiopian language Amharic. D.E.S.T.A FOR AFRICA promotes cultural development through the use of photography by providing workshops, exhibitions and creative exchanges.

 Aïda continues to teach photography and exhibit her work worldwide. A collection of her images can be found in permanent collections in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art and the Museum of Biblical Art in the United States. She is also the recipient of the European Union Prize for her work on Ethiopia in the 2007-7th Rencontres Africaines de la Photographie, in Bamako, Mali."

In 2010, Aida has won the prestigious CRAF International Award for photography. She is someone I look upto, So proud to call my own and look forward to meet one day.