Documentary Photography · Abuja, Nigeria
Visual storyteller documenting resilience, ritual, and the everyday lives of communities across Nigeria.
Stephanie Douglas is a documentary photographer and visual storyteller based in Abuja, Nigeria. With a background in Mass Communication, her work focuses on social and environmental issues — particularly women's experiences and their intersection with community development and sustainability.
Through intimate portraits and community-focused storytelling, she aims to inspire action and foster a deeper understanding of the human stories behind pressing global challenges.
Inside the UNESCO-listed Osun grove, a sacred forest at the heart of Yoruba spiritual life, this series follows the priestesses of Osun — women who serve as living vessels of the goddess. Through intimate access to their rituals of sacrifice and divination, the work explores the quiet authority of devotion, and the ancient relationship between women, water, and the sacred.
Recycling Lives and Landscapes in Abuja — an intimate look at the informal waste collectors who transform discarded plastic and cardboard into economic lifelines, and who quietly hold the city's environment together.
At the heart of the Osun-Osogbo Festival burns the Àtùpà Olójúmérindínlógún — a 600-year-old, 16-point sacred lamp first discovered by the hunter Olutimehin as forest spirits danced around it in the dark. Its 16 flames are said to represent the 16 major Orisa, the 16 Odu Ifa, and the 16 sacred palm nuts of Yoruba spiritual tradition. Each year, in the hours between midnight and dawn, the Ataoja of Osogbo leads priests, priestesses, and devotees in a circling dance around the lit lamp — praying for peace, healing, and communal prosperity. This series documents those hours: the firelight, the faithful, and the quiet weight of a ritual kept alive for six centuries.
Available for documentary assignments, collaborations, and editorial work.
officialstephaniedouglas@gmail.com