These three African photographers are celebrating the birthplace of coffee

Taking coffee back to its roots, the calendar features the photography of Kenyan Thandiwe Muriu, South African Aart Verrips and Nigerian Daniel Obasi.

A giant coffee bean in the middle of a forest, a woman with flowers for eyes camouflaged against a patterned backdrop, and a group of women pulling leafy vines, symbolizing a tug of war with nature, are featured among the images in Lavazza’s 2024 calendar. Every year since 1993, the Italian coffee manufacturer has produced a photography calendar, featuring images from the likes of Helmut Newton, David LaChapelle and Annie Leibovitz. This year’s edition celebrates the African continent as the birthplace of coffee (widely considered to be Ethiopia). Featuring the work of three African photographers, Thandiwe Muriu, Aart Verrips and Daniel Obasi, and themed “More than Us,” the 2024 calendar is dedicated to the 20th anniversary of the Giuseppe e Pericle Lavazza Foundation, a non-profit that supports international sustainability projects in coffee-cultivating countries. “I am so excited by opportunities to provide conversation around Africa and this amazing continent. But the theme itself, for me, was so powerful,” said 33-year-old Kenyan photographer Thandiwe Muriu. “I live in a very communal culture, and our way of life is ‘More than Us’ — you are always your neighbor’s keeper, and I deeply connected with that.” Muriu was introduced to photography at 14 years old by her father, as part of a list of skills her parents wanted to teach her and her three sisters so they could be strong, independent women in an often-patriarchal society. “When he put the camera in my hand, something happened,” she said. “I always enjoyed art, but I could never draw. I always enjoyed music, but I could never sing. But the camera just felt right, and it was almost like one of those moments in a movie. Photography just became the voice that I had been looking for to express everything that I was feeling and experiencing.”