Women behind the lens: ‘I may not be able to decide whose faces are painted on walls but I can make sure female boxers are part of that archive’

Photojournalist Olaoluwa Olowu is documenting the lives of women in Ghana who choose to fight I took this portrait of Elizabeth Boakye, an amateur boxer, in the Abossey Okai neighbourhood of Accra, Ghana, in May 2026. While photographing boxing, I started noticing how much of the sport exists outside the ring. On the streets, there are paintings, graffiti, posters, signs and names celebrating boxers, but almost everything I saw represented male boxers. One day, I saw this painting of a male b...

By Olaoluwa Olowu