Century-old family photo studio keeps Ghana's history in black and white

Record ID: 1687269

  • Title: Century-old family photo studio keeps Ghana's history in black and white
  • Date: 31st August 2022
  • Summary: TAMAKLOE HOLDING PHOTO OF YOUNG BRUCE-VANDERPUIJE
  • Embargoed: 14th September 2022 10:47
  • Keywords: accra africa art culture emerging markets exhibitions film photography ghana history jamestown museums photography west africa
  • Location: ACCRA AND TEMA, GHANA
  • City: ACCRA AND TEMA, GHANA
  • Country: Ghana
  • Topics: Africa,Arts/Culture/Entertainment
  • Reuters ID: LVA00H122529082022RP1
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: A generation before the Gold Coast became Ghana, photographer J.K. Bruce-Vanderpuije opened a small studio in the heart of the colony's capital, Accra.
    That decision would define his family’s lives for a century to come, and enshrine them as the de facto visual historians of a nation that had not yet been born.
    For 100 years, three generations of Bruce-Vanderpuijes have painstakingly amassed the world’s largest collection of 20th century Ghanaian photographs under one roof.
    It's called the Deo Gratias photo studio, and its founders say its the oldest in West Africa.
    From glass plates to digital files, of nation-shaping events or intimate personal portraits, the family’s 50,000-image archive offers a unique glimpse into Accra’s transition from a colonial port into a bustling modern metropolis.
    Today, the archive is maintained by Kate Tamakloe, Bruce's granddaughter.
    "We have, I'm sure, more than 50,000 pictures, you know, it could even be more. We have a lot of glass plates as well, we have a lot of negatives as well. Honestly, the story they tell is about the history, those days, the early days when slaves were taken out. We have pictures of the forts, we have pictures of the politicians, we have pictures of traditions. All of that really. So there is so much to tell, even the buildings," she said.
    Virtually unchanged since opening in 1922, the studio sits along a busy street in the heart of Jamestown, the capital’s oldest district.
    The neighbourhood has missed out on much of the development that has given Ghana it's rising-star reputation, but Deo Gratias stands testament to its past glory and hopeful future.
    Today, the faces of families, musicians, politicians and patrons adorn the the walls in black and white, including those of independence leader Kwame Nkrumah, Britain's Queen Elizabeth, and disgraced American president Richard Nixon.
    Daniel Tetteh, a Ghanaian historian who volunteers with Deo Gratias as an archivist, says their preservation is a matter of national survival.
    "Pictures speak tongues, more than what has been written. If we don't preserve them, it means that the nation will lose its memory, and our children will come and they will not know anything. They. will only be aware of what is happening around them. But we live in a world, a dynamic world, and we must be conscious of the history, the entire spectrum of history, what happened in the past. If you know what happened in the past, then you will appreciate the present and you will be able to predict the future," he said.
    Tamakloe took over Deo Gratias when her father Isaac, a lifelong photographer who inherited the studio from his father, began to lose his eyesight.
    What began as a mission to digitise the archive has since become a full-time job, one she hopes to pass onto the next generation when the time comes.
    Seated in a lush garden outside the capital, Kate and Isaac flipped through an album of their favourite prints.
    One showed Bruce elegantly perched atop a race horse.
    Another showed a young and beaming Isaac aiming his camera towards an unknown subject.
    "One must feel proud that for 100 years something has been preserved, and the coming generation will see what's happened," he said, gripping his cane while Kate looked on with a smile.
    "I also feel very, very much happy that our name has gone so far. And I think that is not the end."
    (Cooper Inveen, Christophe Van Der Perre)
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