Andrew Dosunmu’s ‘The African Game’ comes to Atlanta’s ADAMA

There is a photograph in Andrew Dosunmu’s exhibition ‘The African Game’ that stops people cold. A shirtless man runs through a muddy lot, his back painted red, yellow, and green with the number nine, a flag streaming behind him. Since the show opened at ADAMA, the African Diaspora Art Museum of Atlanta, Fahamu Pecou, ADAMA’s founder and executive director, says he has watched at least 25 or 30 visitors pose beside it, mimicking the man’s stride. 

“That image really grabs people,” said Pecou. “It also draws you into the space.” 

The timing is intentional. ‘The African Game’ opened as the 2026 FIFA World Cup gets underway across the United States, Mexico, and Canada — and as a record ten African nations compete in the tournament for the first time. Dosunmu, a Nigerian-born photographer and filmmaker based between New York and Lagos, spent more than two decades traveling across nine African countries to make the images on view. The work centers not on players on the pitch, but on  fans in the stands, the streets, and the spiritual preparations that precede every match.