Seven Rooms brings together highlights from Hotel, a magazine for new approaches to fiction, non-fiction & poetry which, since its inception in 2016, provided a space for experimental reflection on literature's status as art & cultural mediator. Co-published by Tenement Press and Prototype, this anthology captures, refracts, and reflects a vital moment in independent publishing in the UK, and is built on the shared values of openness, collaboration, and total creative freedom.

'A lyrical investigation ... both powerful and transcendent' CHIGOZIE OBIOMA 'Acutely observed, hauntingly rendered and deeply affecting' AMINATTA FORNA 'Both epic and intimate' MARGO JEFFERSON An astonishing search for a missing person, the hidden tragedies of war and the truth of Nigeria's history. Emmanuel Iduma never met his uncle, his father's favourite brother and the man for whom he is named. The elder Emmanuel left home in 1967 to fight in the Biafran War and was not seen again. The war lasted for three years, with young Igbo men volunteering to fight for a breakaway republic in the chaotic wake of British decolonization. Around one hundred thousand others who fought in the war share a fate like Emmanuel's uncle, though there are no official records of these losses. The tensions that gave rise to the conflict remain live, threatening sometimes to bubble over. In this landscape, there are no monuments or graves. Instead, a collective remembering that remains, for the most part, silent. I Am Still with You sees a young Nigerian return to his place of birth. Travelling the route of the war, Iduma explores both a national history and the mysteries of his own family, finding both somewhat scarred and haunted, the memories warped by time and the darkest parts left for decades unspoken.

Todd Webb is largely known for his skillful photographic documentation of everyday life and architecture in cities, most notably New York and Paris, as well as his photographs of the American West. This new book showcases a different side of Webb’s work, taken from an assignment that took him to eight African countries.

In 1958, Webb was invited by the United Nations to document Togoland (now Togo), Ghana, Kenya, the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland (now Zimbabwe, Zambia and Malawi), Somaliland (now Somalia), Sudan, Tanganyika and Zanzibar (now merged as Tanzania) over a five-month assignment. Equipped with three cameras and briefed to document industrial progress, he returned with approximately 1,500 colour negatives, but less than twenty of them were published, in black and white, by the United Nations Department of Public Information. The archive was then lost for over fifty years and was only rediscovered by the Todd Webb Archive in 2017.

Todd Webb in Africa includes over 150 striking colour photographs from Webb’s African United Nations assignment. This book, and an accompanying touring exhibition, provides expert insight into Webb’s images with contributions by both African and American scholars. Accompanying essays place the photographs in their historical and artistic moment, and provide crucial insight into the role of photography in visualizing national independence and ingrained imperialism.

Namsa Leuba: Crossed Looks is the first artist monograph featuring the work of Swiss-Guinean artist Namsa Leuba. This publication accompanies the first solo exhibition of Namsa Leuba in the United States, at the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art in Charleston, South Carolina on August 27 - December 11, 2021. Crossed Looks features Leuba's major projects to date, including photography series in Guinea, South Africa, Nigeria, Benin, and the debut of a new series recently made in Tahiti. The exhibition and publication consider how Leuba's photographic practice explores the representation of African identity and the cultural Other in the Western imagination. Over 90 photographs inspired by the visual culture and ceremonies of West Africa, contemporary fashion and design, and the history of photography and its colonizing gaze present Leuba's unique perspective that straddles reality and fantasy. Through the adaptation of myths attributed to the Other, Leuba's photographs acknowledge this double act of looking, a cross-dialogue of global cultures. The exhibition is supported by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and from Pro Helvetia. The publication features essays contributed by exhibition curator Joseph Gergel; writer and art critic Emmanuel Iduma; and art historian Dr. Mary Trent. These essays examine the nuanced themes of identity and representation in Leuba's multiple bodies of work.

'A lyrical investigation ... both powerful and transcendent' CHIGOZIE OBIOMA 'Acutely observed, hauntingly rendered and deeply affecting' AMINATTA FORNA 'Both epic and intimate' MARGO JEFFERSON An astonishing search for a missing person, the hidden tragedies of war and the truth of Nigeria's history. Emmanuel Iduma never met his uncle, his father's favourite brother and the man for whom he is named. The elder Emmanuel left home in 1967 to fight in the Biafran War and was not seen again. The war lasted for three years, with young Igbo men volunteering to fight for a breakaway republic in the chaotic wake of British decolonization. Around one hundred thousand others who fought in the war share a fate like Emmanuel's uncle, though there are no official records of these losses. The tensions that gave rise to the conflict remain live, threatening sometimes to bubble over. In this landscape, there are no monuments or graves. Instead, a collective remembering that remains, for the most part, silent. I Am Still with You sees a young Nigerian return to his place of birth. Travelling the route of the war, Iduma explores both a national history and the mysteries of his own family, finding both somewhat scarred and haunted, the memories warped by time and the darkest parts left for decades unspoken.

Ming Smith’s poetic and experimental images are icons of twentieth-century African American life. One of the greatest artist-photographers working today, Smith moved to New York in the 1970s and began to make images charged with startling beauty and spiritual energy. This long-awaited monograph brings together four decades of Smith’s work, celebrating her trademark lyricism, distinctively blurred silhouettes, dynamic street scenes, and deep devotion to theater, music, poetry, and dance—from the “Pittsburgh Cycle” plays of August Wilson to the Afrofuturism of Sun Ra. With never-before-seen images, and a range of illuminating essays and interviews, this tribute to Smith’s singular vision promises to be an enduring contribution to the history of American photography. Copublished by Aperture and Documentary Arts

A unique blend of travelogue, musings and poetry, A Stranger's Pose draws the reader into a world of encounters haunted by the absence of home, estrangement from a lover and family tragedies. The author's recollections and reflections of fragments of his journeys to African cities, from Dakar to Douala, Bamako to Benin, and Khartoum to Casablanca, offer a compelling and very personal meditation on the meaning of home and the generosity of strangers to a lone traveller. Alongside accounts of the author's own travels are other narratives about movement, intimacy, the power of language and translation. Whilst echoing the writings of Anne Michaels and John Berger, this remarkable book charts a path of its own that will redefine travel writing.

In the summer of 2021, the Nigerian artist Emeka Ogboh (*1977) transformed the centre of Frankfurt into a sound landscape on water and on land. The sound installation is dedicated to the city of Frankfurt am Main and offers a possible response to the crisis-ridden year 2020. For Emeka Ogboh, music is a medium for connecting people, regardless of their language, background, or religious denomination. The catalogue documents the staging of THIS TOO SHALL PASS in the city and provides insights into the creation and conception of the work with accompanying text contributions. Parts of the sound installation are made accessible through the integration of augmented-reality elements. Text in English and German.