South Sudan: Birth of a Nation – powerful new series by photographer Zed Nelson of Love Me fame, captures the journey of the world’s newest nation as Africa’s largest country officially split into two after Africa’s longest-running civil war.

Many of South Sudan’s political bosses are former rebel fighters who have lived through a lifetime of war. The long-suffering population are mainly poor, completely uneducated, and living in conditions described by the UN as ‘the least developed place on earth’. The country has oil reserves promising vast revenues which could kick-start development, but $20 billion dollars in oil revenue is already unaccounted for. The capital has grown from little more than a village to a booming city over the past few years. Deals are being made in South Sudan’s new, inexperienced ministries, and the future of South Sudan is up for grabs. Foreigners here are either running charities trying to give money away, or oil companies and entrepreneurs trying to suck profit out of the country as quickly as possible.

Nelson is represented by  INSTITUTE for Artist Management.

“If you ever question that music is the universal language, watch this: A German-speaking teacher tutoring a French-speaking African how to sing an aria in Italian.”

The inspired story of the Kimbanguiste Symphony Orchestra, the only symphony orchestra in Central Africa, which practices in a rented warehouse in the Congo and got its start with no instruments and no professional musicians who knew how to read music – a wonderful addition to other recent innovation in orchestras.

(↬ Open Culture)

Montalboddo’s Africa – this 1508 woodcut is one of the first printed maps of Africa.

(↬Roomthily)