One of the earliest human civilizations was in Egypt, over 5,000 years ago, along the banks of the Nile River. And this also happens to be where British-Egyptian photographer and director Dexter Navy’s latest editorial was made. “If we’re going to do this, it needs to happen there,” he said over Zoom from his home base in London, where he was born and raised. “That’s where the story lives for me. That’s where I come from.”
But he didn’t land on the idea of the location in order to explore his identity or better understand this side of his culture. “I just felt like as an artist, my main goal with everything I make is to be as unique as possible,” said Navy. “I started thinking about the climate of photography, and I realized no one’s shooting in the Middle East, especially in Egypt, at the level I’m shooting.” In a way, it was about claiming new visual territory. “I also wanted to challenge myself to make Egypt contemporary.”
Like many creatives coming up in the early 2010s, Navy found his first audience on Tumblr, the era’s go-to microblogging platform. “I always wanted to be a film director and I started uploading my photos on the platform when I was 19,” said Navy. His early images — ranging from “cool-looking people” at parties to strangers on the Tube — offered an unvarnished slice of life in London. i-D magazine took notice, and he soon became a regular contributor. From there, Navy built a robust body of work that includes campaigns for Dior and a Grammy nomination.
But he didn’t land on the idea of the location in order to explore his identity or better understand this side of his culture. “I just felt like as an artist, my main goal with everything I make is to be as unique as possible,” said Navy. “I started thinking about the climate of photography, and I realized no one’s shooting in the Middle East, especially in Egypt, at the level I’m shooting.” In a way, it was about claiming new visual territory. “I also wanted to challenge myself to make Egypt contemporary.”
Like many creatives coming up in the early 2010s, Navy found his first audience on Tumblr, the era’s go-to microblogging platform. “I always wanted to be a film director and I started uploading my photos on the platform when I was 19,” said Navy. His early images — ranging from “cool-looking people” at parties to strangers on the Tube — offered an unvarnished slice of life in London. i-D magazine took notice, and he soon became a regular contributor. From there, Navy built a robust body of work that includes campaigns for Dior and a Grammy nomination.
He attributes the resonance of his work with audiences to its groundedness in everyday experience. “It’s what most people have in common. I don’t think everyone can relate to luxury and wealth,” he said. “There’s no hierarchy in my photos.”
On a balmy March day, Navy traveled 30 minutes from Cairo to Giza, where a makeshift rooftop basketball court with the pyramids in the backdrop became the set for his shoot. The cast featured Egyptian and Sudanese street-cast models who, at golden hour, held their arms out as if to catch the sun sinking between two pyramids — like a basketball suspended midair. As Navy observed when we spoke, sports like basketball are more than just games in Egypt. “It’s more like community and a form of escapism — where you come together and you’re all the same,” he said. “As humans, we’re all the same. We’re born the same. We die the same.”
In one of the images, Navy’s pride in his heritage took a literal form — he recreated the Egyptian flag on set, complete with a live eagle. “[One thing] I love about Egypt is there’s so much depth to the history of the culture that you can’t even begin to feel like you understand it until you’ve lived it,” said Navy. “So it might take me my whole life to really feel Egyptian.”
In Navy’s photos, you can feel the past, still visible from this rooftop in Cairo, the present, and the mystery of what’s to come.
On a balmy March day, Navy traveled 30 minutes from Cairo to Giza, where a makeshift rooftop basketball court with the pyramids in the backdrop became the set for his shoot. The cast featured Egyptian and Sudanese street-cast models who, at golden hour, held their arms out as if to catch the sun sinking between two pyramids — like a basketball suspended midair. As Navy observed when we spoke, sports like basketball are more than just games in Egypt. “It’s more like community and a form of escapism — where you come together and you’re all the same,” he said. “As humans, we’re all the same. We’re born the same. We die the same.”
In one of the images, Navy’s pride in his heritage took a literal form — he recreated the Egyptian flag on set, complete with a live eagle. “[One thing] I love about Egypt is there’s so much depth to the history of the culture that you can’t even begin to feel like you understand it until you’ve lived it,” said Navy. “So it might take me my whole life to really feel Egyptian.”
In Navy’s photos, you can feel the past, still visible from this rooftop in Cairo, the present, and the mystery of what’s to come.