Images Out of Africa

In 1938, Virginia and Ray Garner began making films in the Belgian Congo and French Cameroons. This book features Virginia Garner's diaries, which highlight the challenges of making films in Africa in the 1930s and include rich descriptions of cross-cultural interactions and micro-negotiations with chiefs, headmen, and villagers.

Virginia Garner began her career in photography with the Africa Motion Picture Project, as she and her husband, Ray Garner, developed their film-making collaboration that was to last fifty years. Her diaries chronicle the adventures of their early married life in central Africa and the challenges of producing ten short films they made in 1938-39. Glenn Reynolds is assistant professor of history at Mount Saint Mary College in Newburgh, New York. He teaches U.S. history and a wide array of non-Western history courses, with a research emphasis on the origins of cinema in Africa.

Chapter 1 Introduction Chapter 2 Chapter 1: Africa Diary: 1938 Chapter 3 Chapter 2: Africa Diary: 1939 Chapter 4 Chapter 3: Garner Equipment List Chapter 5 Chapter 4: Film Scenario: "A Day in an African Village"