Between Nostalgia & Dreams, the latest exhibition by Ethiopian American photographer Yusuf Ahmed is ongoing at The Africa Center at Aliko Dangote Hall in New York City. This deeply personal and evocative collection explores the objects that immigrants hold onto as artifacts that tether them to their histories, identities, and the places they've left behind.
Aby's story stands out among the exhibition's subjects. In The Adoption Album (2022), we see an intimate still-life of an old photo album, its cover marked with years of handling. "I've carried this photo album to every city I've moved to since the orphanage," Aby reflects. "Growing up as an adoptee, I often felt like I was denied a past that was very much real to me."
This sentiment resonates deeply with Ahmed's broader vision of his work acting as a counter to the erasure of immigrant narratives, a way to reclaim history through the objects that endure. "I realized I've always detached from objects, having moved a lot," Ahmed shared. "But talking to others, I started to see how sentimentality and memory are intertwined."
