Werner Mansholt

The assumption is that the name Zanzibar means‭ “‬coast of the blacks.‭” ‬Famous for their spices,‭ ‬the group of islands,‭ ‬30‭ ‬kilometres off the East African coast,‭ ‬is an autonomous part of Tanzania.‭ ‬At one time,‭ ‬their significant placement in the Indian Ocean and the slave trade ensured that the capital city of Stone Town was both rich and opulent.‭ ‬That was a long time ago.‭ ‬In‭ ‬1964,‭ ‬a socialist government put an end to the reign of sultans and British colonial lords.‭ ‬Nowadays,‭ ‬Zanzibar lives from coconut palm,‭ ‬spices,‭ ‬seaweed cultivation and tourism.‭ ‬Even so,‭ ‬daily life in Zanzibar remains largely unchanged,‭ ‬with most work being done by hand‭ – ‬machines are virtually unknown.‭ ‬At the end of February this year,‭ ‬Mansholt travelled to Zanzibar for two weeks,‭ ‬equipped with‭ ‬20‭ ‬rolls of slide film,‭ ‬four lenses,‭ ‬his Leica M6,‭ ‬and the eternal question,‭ ‬where is the navel of the world‭? ‬When he was a child,‭ ‬he traced his finger across the pages of an atlas,‭ ‬following the routes of the great explorers.‭ ‬Hoping to give form to the concepts of geography and time,‭ ‬Mansholt developed a longing for distant places‭ – ‬one of them was Zanzibar.