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All images are printed with archival inks on archival Lyson Standard Fine Art 310 gsm paper, edition of 10, unless otherwise noted. (In addition, chemical prints of some images can be ordered—please inquire about this option.
The following books are also available for purchase:
Peter Magubane, June 16, 1976, limited millenium edition,signed copies =
Alf Kumalo. Itala Vivan (ed.), 1998
Beyond the Barricades: Popular Resistance in South Africa, 1989
South Africa: The Cordoned Heart, Omar Badsha (ed.), 1986
Santu Mofokeng
The Bang Bang Club: Snapshots from a Hidden War, Marinovich & Silva, 2000
The Short Century, Okwui Enwezor (ed.)
Democracy’s Image: Photography and Visual Art after Apartheid, 1998
Click on images for details
Mandela Welcome Home Rally, Umtata, March 31, 1990
ANC Youth members link hands to welcome Mandela after 27 years imprisonment. Mandela grew up in Qunu, close to Umtata, capital of the former “homeland” of the Transkei. The symbolic weapon is engraved with logos for the ANC, Umkhonto we Sizwe [Spear of the Nation, military wing of the ANC], and the South African Communist Party. The bandolier of bullets is made from garden hose
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Digital print, edition of 5
Helen Joseph, veteran ANC leader, speaking at the memorial service for assassinated UDF leader, Victoria Mxenge, whose husband was also assassinated
Then-bishop Desmond Tutu speaking against “necklacing” at a mass funeral.
Police use a Land Rover with a sneeze machine to disperse crowds
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Cibachrome or chemical print, open edition
Joyce Seroke and Emma Mashinini (now in the South African department of Land Affairs) confront police and dogs. Sowetans strongly protested the fact that government minister Piet Koornhof was granted an honorary key to Soweto. Kumalo’s shadow divides the composition.
Frances Baard at the launch of the UDF (United Democratic Front)
The mass funeral for 19 victims of the Uitenhage Massacre, which occurred on March 21, 1985 when police opened fire on a peaceful crowd marching to a commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the Sharpeville Massacre
A lone woman protests as the soldiers occupying her township roll by in armored military vehicles called “hippos.”
Michael Cheslyn Miranda, aged 11, lies in open casket. Michael was one of three boys shot by police in the notorious “Trojan Horse” incident. The police had concealed themselves in wooden crates loaded onto a flat-bed truck belonging to the South African Railways, and driven up and down a residential township street to provoke violence against the government-owned vehicle. When a crowd of some 200 people had gathered and began stoning the truck, the police sprang from their hiding places and without warning fired pump-action shotguns into the crowd. The pathologist report found that Michael and another boy had been shot in the back.
Workers leaving a May Day meeting find riot police blocking the entrance of Khotso [“Peace”] House, a building that housed many UDF and pro-democracy organizations
This graffito alludes to the “Trojan Horse Incident” in which police shot black student protestors whose mothers served as nannies raising white children.
A defeated resident watches as shacks are razed after days of fighting with conservative forces.
A South African policeman monitors a protest permitted under the Ai-Gams Declaration, which relaxed some political restrictions in Namibia, then called South West Africa (SWA).
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Digital print, edition of 5
A child lies in the street in front of military vehicles during a protest march.
A gathering of rightwing supporters in Pretoria Square demonstrate against the political changes of F. W. de Klerk’s National Party in 1990. The ANC, PAC (Pan African Congress), and other political organizations were unbanned and Nelson Mandela and other political leaders were released from prison. The anger and frustration of the these people was clear; they could not believe that the National Party “traitors” were “giving their country to the black man.”
A meeting commemorating the Soweto Uprising of June 16, which is now a national holiday.
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Digital print, edition of 30
At the South African Defence Force display at the Rand Easter Show, South Africa’s largest annual trade and agriculture expo
A parade celebrating the 75th anniversary of the South African Defence Force.
Families flee from their homes in the pro-ANC squatter settlement of Phola Park after an overnight attack by Inkatha members left 7 people dead
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Digital print, edition of 5
Man weeps as shack burns. In many urban areas of South Africa, tension escalated between activists, who increasingly took control within the townships, and conservative residents who resented their authority
The funeral of David Webster, a leading academic and labor activist who was assassinated outside his home by right-wing elements within the South African security services
During the defiance campaign against segregated beaches, police force protestors off this whites-only beach. The following year, Mandela was released and most social segregation was scrapped
A woman searches for her son in the police mortuary, after fighting in the area.
Police fire a water cannon at protesting youth
Strike meeting of the Post and Telecommunications Workers Association.
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Digital print, edition of 30
Police watch from their armored vehicle as ANC supporters toyi-toyi (perform a militant dance) on their way to a rally in Thokoza, east of Johannesburg. “ANC supporters and the police often played a dangerous game of taunting each other, and it didn’t take much to push the game into a real violent altercation” (Williams, Jan. 2002).
This Pulitzer Prize- winning image shows an ANC supporter hacking into the burning and wounded body of Lindsay Tshabalala, a Zulu migrant worker suspected of Inkatha membership. Inkatha’s opposition to the ANC was both ideological and ethnic, since the ANC had a significant proportion of non-Zulu leaders. The South African government and its allies, including the intelligence community within the US, believed that supporting Inkatha would undermine the constituency of the leftist ANC
A girl leads her sister to safety as an impi, or regiment, of Inkatha-supporting Zulu warriors approaches during the hostel wars. Ken Oosterbroek was killed here four years later. Many of his images cannot therefore be accurately dated or adequately captioned
Police wait for the body collection vehicle, behind the corpse of a necklace victim in Sebokeng township, south of Johannesburg. During the 1980s an early 1990s this form of punishment was popular with ANC- supporting youth. “The smell of burning tires, flesh and petrol is not something that leaves you easily” (Williams, Jan. 2002)
The body of a man lies in the middle of a road in Alexandra township after another night of violence between the ANC and Inkatha supporters
A march organized by the ANC, SACP (South African Communist Party), and COSATU (Congress of South African Trade Unions) to protest the continuing Train Wars and to demand the release of all political prisoners, rights for workers, and an acceleration of political change
ANC supporters at a June 16 commemoration rally advocate the killing of white farmers. The Afrikaans word “boere” literally means farmers, but it was also used derisively to apply to all Afrikaners and to the police. The English translation here erases those ambiguities. Since the 1994 elections, white farmers in remote areas have been targeted. The South African government denies any involvement, and it has been alleged that the Pan African Congress, the black consciousness party that advocated the return of the land but garnered little electoral support, might be behind the killings. Currently, however, the SA government’s muted reaction to events in neighboring Zimbabwe, where farmers have been killed and dispossessed without compensation, has raised international concern.
An ANC supporter hides behind a police vehicle during a gun battle with Inkatha – supporting hostel dwellers. The man was shot through the mouth and the bullet came out the side if his head.
Taxi ownership reflected the same division as that between ANC – supporting township residents and Zulu – based Inkatha members. Rival taxi groups fought “taxi wars.” Sasol is a South African company that produces gasoline from coal. It was considered patriotic to buy Sasol gas to reduce dependence on imported fuel and bypass international sanctions.
A peaceful demonstration against racism.
This severely injured man is tagged for priority among many others.
Soldiers try to assist a woman shot in the street
ANC marchers, including several national leaders and priests, broke through the border of the former “homeland” of Ciskei to pressure it’s leader, Brigadier Oupa Gqozo, to allow free political activity there. In response, Ciskei security forces opened fire. Here, the marchers flee back toward the South African side of the “frontier.” Twenty-nine marchers were killed and scores wounded in this incident, the Bisho Massacre.
Hani, a Communist Party and ANC leader, was assassinated by a white rightwinger. Outside the soccer stadium where the funeral vigil was held, grief and outrage among his supporters led to a violent confrontation with government forces, who fired teargas and live rounds at them.
In what became known as the “train wars” of the early 1990s, township commuters in the Johannesburg metropolitan region were terrorized by “warriors” wielding traditional weapons. Getting to and from work was harrowing and, for many, fatal. While Inkatha supporters were responsible for much of this violence, shadowy elements in the South African security establishment also recruited foreign blacks to attack citizens. They killed in absolute silence, lest speaking betray they alien status.
A rally of the AWB (Afrikaner Weerstand Beweeging) (Afrikaner Resistance Movement), held near the home of its dangerously eloquent and charismatic leader, Eugene Terreblanche. The AWB’s modified swastika logo was but one of its many parallels with Nazism and other racial suprematist movements
As democratic elections neared, the AWB and other white separatist movements supported the idea of a whites-only Afrikaner “homeland.” Despite their racist platform, this allied them with the regimes of the black “homelands.” These AWB members rushed to the defense of the crumbling regime Bophuthatswana. They were executed at point-blank range by Bophuthatswana forces in the capital. The man pleading for his life here was shot seconds later.
TJ Lemon recalls, “On the Mmabatho weekend, I was riding with Ken Oosterbroek. Ken was letting us crash in his hotel room — he was very generous. We were cruising. Each day was a different story — stonings, ducking and being accosted by the Bophuthatswana police and the right wing…a couple of good tales. As for the execution, I drove in to the initial exchange of fire. It’s a long story but Nachtwey, Bodenstein, and I are the only guys who got them being nailed on film” (TJ Lemon, Jan. 2002).
Graeme Williams also witnessed this incident, which was a turning point in his life. It ended his career in documenting hard news: “I got out after having a shotgun put to my mouth during the Mmabatho weekend. It was a strange thing, I just knew that I was no longer bulletproof. Once you are aware of your own vulnerability, you start to get hurt. I have now moved towards more personal work which is not reliant on adrenaline surges” (Williams, Jan. 2002)
A mannequin outside a looted shopping center. “The [Bophuthatswana] army who were positioned outside the cent er would alternate between allowing people to loot the shops and then opening fire on a few people. The residents of nearby areas carried off all that they could. The looted shops were also set on fire, which caused the sprinklers to flood the shopping cen ter. Inside the supermarket was a bizarre scene with bodies and supermarket produce floating on the knee – deep water. I watched an elderly woman take her time to select her favorite brand of chutney, place it in her shopping basket and then move down the ai sle, seemingly oblivious to the mayhem about her” (Williams, Jan. 2002)
Mass Action march to the Union Buildings, South Africa’s equivalent of the Congress buildings in D.C.
The Shell House Massacre occurred on March 28, 1994, when Inkatha supporters, armed with traditional weapons, marched through downtown Johannesburg to attack the ANC headquarters. The man lying dead in the street was shot from a window in the surrounding apartment blocks. “Minutes before the shooting I had walked next to this man as we followed the procession along a road in central Johannesburg” (Williams, Jan. 2002).
Alexandra men’s hostel, Johannesburg, 1990
A induna (Zulu leader) at an Inkatha rally.
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Digital print, edition of 5
Nelson Mandela, ever the consummate diplomat, chose to cast his ballot in the troubled province of KwaZulu-Natal, the base of Inkatha support. Paul Weinberg was the only photographer to capture this historic moment
Youths clamber on an election billboard.
Comrades carry the first victim of the student uprising
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Digital and chemical prints also available. Open edition
Jabulani Stadium, Soweto, Jan. 19, 1992
A Zulu elder wears a leopard-skin mask at an Inkatha rally
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Digital print, edition of 5
Mndantsane Stadium, East London, Eastern Cape, 1990
Shortly after Mandela’s release, workers at the Mercedes Benz factory here presented him with a car purchased from overtime earnings. The car was red, a militant symbolism also underscored by the SACP logo on this “gun” and its anti-Inkatha slogan.
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Digital print, edition of 5
When this public pool in the desert town of De Aar was racially integrated in 1991, AWB right wingers attacked and evicted “colored” children using the pool
Indigent migrants, known as “Cart People,” get back on the road after voting in their first democratic elections
While the world’s media focused on the snaking lines of patient voters on election day, not all was peaceful that day, as this picture proves.
An old man walks the street
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Digital print, edition of 11
Winnie Mandela returned to Soweto in defiance of her banishment to a remote desert town. Banning orders restricted activists to specific locations and effectively silenced them. Generally, it was illegal for a banned person to speak if more than one other person was present. Until Nelson Mandela’s release in 1990, it also was illegal to display his image
The following images pay tribute to a few of the many photographers of the events of 1976-1994. They took great risks and suffered injury, harassment, arrest, and psychological trauma to capture what the state so desperately wanted to hide. They not only documented history, they created compelling images despite shooting under fire.
In the 1991-1994 period, photographers Ken Oosterbroek, Greg Marinovich,Joao Silva, and Kevin Carter, were dubbed The Bang Bang Club by South African media. In a book by the same name, Marinovich and Silva reflect on their work, their triumphs (two Pulitzers), and tragedies (Ken Oosterbroek’s death and Kevin Carter’s suicide shortly after he received the New York Times’s first Pulitzer for photography).
Ken Oosterbroek was killed on April 17, 1994, while covering a firefight between Inkatha supporters and members of the National Peacekeeping Force (NPKF), a transitional security force composed largely of rightwing SA police, SA and “homeland”soldiers, and guerillas from the former liberation armies.Greg Marinovich was shot three times in the same incident. Prompt action by colleagues, including James Nachtwey, gothim to hospital in time, where he underwent 5 emergency operations in 5 days, then two more. Later, he wrote about his experience, “I felt strangely relieved that I had finally been shot. I had always experienced guilt about being a passing voyeur during other people’s moments of tragedy. A strong sense of peace came over me, a feeling that I had now paid my dues.”
Though Oosterbroek’s inquest found nobody to blame, a NPKF member later told Marinovich and Joao Silva that the NPKF had been responsible.
As this exhibition shows, the Bang Bang Club weren’t the only photographers covering the pre-election violence. TJ Lemon remarks, “Realistically it was like a pool of guys. I think Greg and Joao saw themselves as very committed but they weren’t the only shooters, and the so-called Bang Bang Club wasn’t a joined-at-the-hip clique.Ken and Kevin, Joao and Greg—to different extents andat different times were friends with, and rode with, other guys. We freelancers tried to ride with guys who had company cars. Ken and Joao had the use of The Star’s vehicle, in which they “cruised” the townships on “dawn patrols”. I sometimes went along, but the car was full most days. I think this was one of the clues to the Bang Bang Club … The Star car” (Lemon, Jan. 2002).
Alf Kumalo is roughed up by police at a boxing match.
Greg Marinovich injured by police birdshot during clashes between the authorities and residents of Westbury, a so-called “Coloured” township in Johannesburg
An entry in Oosterbroek’s diary, dated Friday, May 20, 1988 reads: ” I hope I die with the best fucking news pic of all time on my neg. — it wouldn’t really be worth it otherwise.”
Photographer TJ Lemon is assisted by a colleague after being injured as students attacked vehicles passing the university during an uprising against the apartheid homeland state of Bophutatswana that led to it’s overthrow.
Award-winning photographers Joao Silva (left) and the late Ken Oosterbroek (middle) talk to Jan Hamman (back to camera) at the Chris Hani funeral.
To see more works and enquire about prices, contact Axis Gallery.