AFRIMAGES grew from the will of a group of photojournalists working in Africa and empowered by the desire to propose a totally new glance on the current events and on African realities. Indeed, the development of the digital technology and that of the new technologies of the communication in general do not allow enough time to photographers to stand back in order to analyze the facts and the events which they have to describe. And most of the time, the produced images reflect a request from the Western world, whose media are fond of dramatic and superficial contexts.

Paradoxically, this process became inescapable for the distribution and the marketing of their works. Then, with the support of experienced photojournalists’ network on one the hand, and with the control of distribution tools on the other hand, AFRIMAGES makes the link between an endogenous, positive and dynamic iconography of the continent and a structure of modern distribution, adapted global trade of press photography.

Beyond this, this new agency’s mission is to propose to African photographers, professionals of the image and to anyone interested in this field of activity – wherever he comes from – who share the common concern to push the African iconography and of its Diaspora upward, a forum of exchange and reflection on the realities, the stakes and the perspectives of photojournalism in Africa. It is a question of involving the African photographer in the construction a legal setting required for the practice of the profession, for the defence of its rights and its working conditions. Regulations on photography regrettably are almost non-existent on the continent.

Objectives
Propose to photographers working on the continent a means of expression and a tool of distribution towards the national and the international level.
Allow photojournalists to practice their profession on an independent and professional basis with a system of Web distribution technologically adapted to the international requirements for the marketing of press photography.
Encourage authors to develop an endogenous iconography, a vision of the current events close to African realities and to impose it on the whole world.
Supply the producers with the means to develop their aesthetic sense, their creativity and their documentary glance on the African society.
Propose to photographers of the continent a forum for meeting and exchange to examine the state and the perspectives of photojournalism as it is practised in Africa and in the world