Elijah Ndoumbe is a multidisciplinary artist, storyteller, dream-weaver, and collaborator. They engage lens-based work as a practice of care that is capable of producing a radical-care-politic in community, in collaboration, in collective production and intentionality. Feelings of breath, body, space, desire, music and movement are key elements to their process of image-making.
In 2020 they were a mentee for the Berlin-based Forecast Forum where they developed a multimedia food-based project and installation focusing on Franco-Cameroonian legacies of cooking and community via familial recipes and processes of making. Their work has screened at the Sundance Film Festival (2022) and won awards at both NewFest (2021) and the Durban International Film Festival (2022). Ndoumbe was a 2021 artist in residence at Black Rock Senegal, and exhibited photographs paired with sonic soundscapes at the 2022 DAK’ART Biennale as part of Kehinde Wiley’s Black Rock 40 exhibit. They exhibited at the Rencontres de Bamako African Photography Biennale (2022-2023), participated in CPH:LAB via CPH:DOX (2022-2023), and exhibited work as a winner of art prize Utopi·e at the Magasin Generaux in Paris, France (2023). They are a recipient of the 2023 Bourse ADIAF Émergence, were announced as a finalist for the 2023 Robert Giard Grant for Emerging Photographers, and were a participating fellow in RAW and Doual'art Session 10 Académie on the theme of Landmarks in Douala, Cameroon (October 2023). They are the inaugural digital resident of Photoworks UK (November 2023), and are currently in development on a project with artists between France, Senegal, and the US. They exhibited at Galerie Sans Titre in Paris (December 2023) and have an upcoming exhibition at Praz Delavallade in February 2024 (Paris, FR).