Winfried Bullinger: Pastoralist Homes

An archive of a disappearing African architectural heritage, captured by the realist, reverent eye of Bullinger

Since 2008, German photographer Winfried Bullinger (born 1965) has traveled around Eastern and Central Africa, capturing the vernacular architecture of these regions. In this physical archive of his long-term project, Bullinger portrays a diverse array of African pastoralists’ homes, including tents, open dwellings and huts. Despite their variety, the structures are all made from materials available directly on site; they are radically efficient and sustainable.
Implementing a silver-gelatin technique, Bullinger shoots with a large-format camera and honors the capricious natural light of day. Although he captures few inhabitants in his images, Bullinger records their many traces. Indeed, his photographs are born from a dialogue with the inhabitants and reveal architecture as a direct response, refined over centuries, to a people’s specific environment and culture. Bullinger’s conscientious formal and interpersonal decisions culminate in this valuable record of rapidly disappearing African architectural heritage.