A new survey of photography from across Africa treats the pavement, the market and the roadside as a theatre. Street Photography Africa, edited by Nadine Barth and Azu Nwagbogu and published by Thames & Hudson in October 2026, brings together hundreds of pictures by 33 photographers, each of them working in the open air in a different city.

The book moves from country to country rather than settling in one place. Its pages visit the markets of Dakar and Lagos, the sidewalks of Abidjan and the Beherawi neighbourhood of Addis Ababa, alongside scenes from Accra, Lomé and Abuja. Musicians and dancers appear next to everyday routines and street fashion, and the range of styles is deliberately wide, from colour portraits to black-and-white frames.

The photographers include Kothegrapher in Abuja, Tsion Haileselassie in Addis Ababa, Sarah Waiswa in Abidjan, Jude Lartey in Accra, Delali Ayivi in Lomé, Stephen Tayo in Lagos, Naëtt Mbaye in Dakar and Alexandre Gandaho, also in Dakar. Their subjects range from a man balancing a stack of hats on his head as he crosses the road to two teenagers in matching dresses and a couple posed sideways on a bicycle.

Running to nearly 300 pages, the volume is built around a single premise, that the street becomes a stage. It presents public life as performance and portraiture at once: people dressed for the camera, caught mid-dance or simply going about their day, with the city itself supplying the backdrop. The pictures featured alongside the book are shared with permission from the publisher, and the survey is presented as a portrait of everyday life across the continent rather than a tour of its landmarks.