New Yorkers can visit secluded African landmarks without leaving Manhattan, thanks to Sosena Solomon. The celebrated Ethiopian-American film director created twelve transformative short films for the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Solomon found documenting the locations in Sub-Saharan Africa as creatively fulfilling as it was culturally impactful. “We went to 12 countries in a year and a half, and it was just the most intense thing I’ve ever done,” Solomon tells ESSENCE. “I can’t compare it to any other experience.” Three of the films will be permanently displayed in the institution’s “newly reimagined African Art galleries.” They represent an effort to reconsider how major cultural institutions are framing the African diaspora.
She considered visiting the Rock-Hewn Churches of Tigray, Ethiopia, a personal pilgrimage. “It’s two and a half hours of climbing these really steep hills,” she says. “This is what the locals do. This is not just for show, or for film or just, you know, this is what everyday Ethiopians do just to get to their place of worship,” she continues. “It was just an honor to be able to do that.”
Her films are not full of the instantly recognizable tourist traps that frequently flood “For You” pages. The cultural monuments and heritage sites are less accessible. “Physically, it was such an emotional moment for us to be able to not just recreate that experience, but to have to go through it ourselves,” she adds.
Other museums and galleries are rethinking their relationships with the continent. Contemporary context about countries in Africa is being infused in spaces where it was absent before. Prior to taking on the project, Solomon interviewed with the Ceil and Michael E. Pulitzer Curator for African Art, Curator in Charge of The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing, Alisa LaGamma, and the Senior Regional Director, Africa for the World Monuments Fund Steven Battle. The process was refreshing. “We were so in sync. It just felt so destined,” she says “We were all aligned in our vision for Africa and African storytelling and cultural heritage and preservation work.”
She knew she was uniquely qualified to take on the ambitious project as a director and educator. They did, too. “All my projects have really prepared me for this moment,” says Solomon, who has been documenting nuance for years. She directed Dreaming of Jerusalem (2021) and Living While American (2022.)
“It’s been an incredibly personal journey that’s been rooted in memory preservation and reverence, for me, and just to have it live at the Met permanently, it’s just an incredibly proud moment.”
Solomon takes a subtle approach in her work. It is not about larger-than-life mythmaking. The narration is not a droll listing of facts. The visuals are not a series of sensationalized spectacles. Her short films are full of soft moments exploring Yoruba spirituality, Nigerian urban planning, the hills of Botswana, and other locations with subtlety and respect.
These projects are not devoid of passion, but the lens is more precise and respectful than aggressive or saccharine. Drones invite the viewer into a clear perspective, not an allegedly impartial record that sees itself as unquestionable. She worked with local filmmakers and drone operators to execute her vision, who put her on to the hottest new artists in every nation. That energy worked its way into the final edits. She spent hours editing, listening to Afrobeats, and losing herself in the creative process.
“There’s always been from this very like historical objective point of view, which is lovely—but I think what sets this series apart is that we really went into the nuances, and we really navigated the personal histories and the emotional histories,” says Solomon. “I think these films actually move you and then take you to these places and really allow you to see why they are so valuable. And so that’s a very different way of navigating the stories.”
Preserving these sites for the historical record is vital as they are not guaranteed to exist for the next generations. “A lot of these sites are in danger,” says Solomon. “There’s a lot of threat… We don’t know if it’s going to be there tomorrow, and so these films are a way to document them in this present moment.”
She captures moments that feel accessible even if the journey to preserve them is not. The glimpses that she offers viewers put them in the shoes of those who have these rare sites embedded into their everyday lives. When shifting weather patterns, population migrations, and other factors bring change to these places, her work will tell their stories.
“I get to a site, and I want to encapsulate what it feels like. I want that to be translated in the imagery,” says Solomon. “I think that’s something that is rare in a lot of African historical storytelling and documentaries.”
The new African Galleries at the Metropolitan Museum of Art open on May 31.