This photographic series was commissioned by Tate Liverpool for an exhibition in spring 2003. Rut Blees Luxemberg set out to examine the paradoxical situations brought about by the concrete reality of modernity's urban vision within an African metropolis. She made the work and carried out the contextual research in Dakar in collaboration with curator and writer Dr Clementine Deliss, who facilitated her initial contacts with the artists there with whom she discussed the ways in which the various historical narratives (colonial, religious and modernist) are inscribed into the city fabric. As the maritime centre of West Africa, Dakar has historical links to Liverpool via colonialism and the slave and sugar trades. Blees Luxemberg's photographs situated the modern African metropolis in the context of the collision between French colonial architecture and the international style (such as the former Musée Dynamique) and the contemporary public and domestic 'architecture Senegalese'.

Consistent with her ongoing inquiry into the relationship between photography and time, Phantom explored the impact of nature on the urban environment, and attempted to articulate the different ways of building and inhabiting a city using Dakar as a case study. Blees Luxemberg experimented with photographing buildings and urban landscapes at night using the only light sources available, such as neon signs or streetlamps. The photographic record in the portfolio demonstrates her examination of the use of a large-format camera for the particular exploration of the specific urban vernacular of Dakar, by making long-exposure photographs which lasted 10–15 minutes. This project aimed to show a modern African metropolis in more positive ways a fashion and culture capital and a city that connects with contemporary Liverpool. Phantom toured around Spain during 2003–4; works were purchased for their permanent collection by Tate, London, and the Art Gallery of New South Wales.