A City Under Construction, A Profession in Transition

Endale Shiferaw, a photographer in his late twenties, once navigated Addis Ababa’s congested streets from behind the wheel of a car. Today, he navigates them through a viewfinder.

Ad

Ad

More than a year ago, as sweeping upgrades wrapped up around the Sheraton Addis Hotel under the city’s corridor development program, Endale noticed a subtle change. People lingered for longer, more families strolled, and couples frequently posed for pictures within and outside Friendship Park, built right across from the hotel. Children ran between manicured hedges and newly installed streetlights. The sidewalks, widened and paved, no longer hurried pedestrians along; they invited them to stay.

Where people pause, photographs follow.

Ad

Ad

Addis Ababa’s corridor development and riverside rehabilitation projects have rolled out in phases over the past three years, radically transforming the city’s aesthetics and settlement patterns. Roads have been widened and resurfaced; pedestrian walkways have been constructed; entire neighborhoods have been razed, riverbanks restored; and landscaped public spaces have been expanded across multiple sub-cities. Public spaces like Friendship Park and the refurbished palace grounds now draw families, courting couples, and diaspora visitors, many of whom arrive with a shared intention: to leave with a printed memory.

For decades, a printed photograph meant a studio appointment, a fixed indoor space with staged backdrops, controlled lighting, and prints delivered days later. The ritual was deliberate and formal. A portrait was an occasion.

That model has not completely disappeared. But the city’s redesigned corridors and parks have opened room for another format: open-air, instant, transactional. Photographers position themselves at park entrances, along pedestrian walkways, and against newly designed fountains and arches. A digital click is either followed by a file sent to customers or the hum of a portable printer in the case of well-established photographers. Within minutes, an image, glossy and warm, is handed across or fitted into one’s gallery.

Photography in Addis Ababa appears to be moving, quite literally, into the street.

It was this shift in how and where images were made that altered Endale’s path. “I had an interest in photography, so when I had the chance, I got training and joined the establishment,” he told Shega. “If it weren’t for the urban development projects, I wouldn’t be doing this.”

He now works the revitalized district around the Sheraton, serving tourists, families, and couples drawn to the area’s renewed aesthetics and greenery.

The model he joined is widely known as attraction photography, a format common in amusement parks and heritage sites worldwide, where commemorative images are part of the visitor economy. In Addis Ababa, it has taken root in redeveloped corridors and parks, transforming beautified public space into a stage set.

This evolution has echoes in history. When Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann transformed Paris in the 1850s and 1860s, razing cluttered medieval quarters to build sweeping boulevards and leafy public parks, he opened the city to new ways of seeing and being seen. Photographers moved outdoors. Eugène Atget spent decades recording the old streets that were vanishing and the new public spaces emerging, helping birth modern urban photography. Commercial photographers soon set up along the boulevards and in parks, offering quick portraits to strollers and visitors, the direct ancestors of today’s attraction photography.

Unlike the studio system of old, attraction photography operates in motion. Photographers approach clients, negotiate angles, adjust for light, and print on demand. The work is physical, public, and competitive.

It is also regulated.

Photographers seeking to operate in designated zones must register through their kebele using official identification. Upon approval, they receive an identification badge and are assigned specific areas where they are legally permitted to work. Registration does not include equipment or financial support; cameras, printers, ink, paper, and transport are privately financed.

“The licensing process serves to formalize the occupation,” said Abraham Ewentu, who has worked in his family’s studio since 2020. “It places photographers within a structured professional environment and integrates them into the tax system.” 

Yet formality does not always translate into clarity. Abraham described being assigned a license to work at the airport, only to be denied access by airport authorities. “Changing the location has been difficult due to a lack of cooperation with the kebele,” he said.

Even so, he considers the business viable. On slow days, he estimates photographing around 200 people; on busy holidays, more than 500. At 30 Birr per print on ordinary days and 50 Birr on holidays, gross revenue can range from 6,000 Birr to 25,000 Birr during holidays before printing costs, transportation, and taxes. The margins depend on foot traffic, and on weather, public mood, and the social calendar.

As the corridor development has molded the daily routines of Addis Ababa’s street photography scene, it has also reoriented packages offered by the wedding industry.

Newlywed, Lidya Samuel, selected the old palace grounds in Arat Kilo after seeing images circulate on social media.

 “We saw photos online and liked them,” she says.

In a city where romance now often begins in private chat threads, it culminates in carefully curated public imagery.

Not all choices are digitally inspired. Kalkidan Sisaye and G/Selasie Hailemariam, who promised to each other as children through a longstanding family arrangement, are also preparing for an outdoor session at the palace.

 “Since I don’t know Addis well, I went with what the photographer suggested,” G/Selasie said, pointing to the influence studios continue to wield in directing aesthetic decisions.

Yet the very accessibility of these spaces has prompted unease among some professionals.

Netsanet Fikadu, a senior wedding photographer at Robe Studio near 22 Mazoria, acknowledges the logistical advantages of the new parks. “We used to travel