A new photo exhibition takes the mask as its inspiration. Wayne Robbins investigates
It’s a late Saturday afternoon in 1996. Corner of Rissik and Wolmarans streets, Johannesburg. A boy finds a paper mask in a bin, puts it on. African kid in a discarded European mask. Graeme Williams takes a picture.
For Williams, photography is about going out and finding something. It’s about “things coming together in an unorchestrated way. When that happens there’s a feeling of elation. But it doesn’t happen often. The payback’s not big. It’s all patience, hanging in there.”
Backstage at the Birdcage, Benoni, 1998. The floor is littered with make-up, clothes, a boa, shoes. Legs crossed, arm over legs, a man in a bra stares into the corner.
With the advent of democracy Williams the photographer found himself freed. He could explore without having his work constantly dictated to by the all-powerful theme of apartheid. The flip side of this is that the world-at-large is not nearly as interested in South Africa as it used to be. Photographers have to work harder to gain attention.
Slovo Section, Thokoza, early Nineties. A shop has been looted, the owner chased off. The pock-marked wall has that familiar war zone look. A piece of plaster has fallen away, leaving a hole the shape of Africa. A kid with a shy smile stands arms outspread in the hole. Themba Hadebe takes a picture.
Hadebe lived in Thokoza at the time. He remembers feeling that the Thokoza story that the newspapers were telling was very different to what he was experiencing daily. He resolved to tell things as he saw them through photography. At the same time he had to return home and be part of the community at the end of each day. “But I was lucky,” says Hadebe. “I had a life through my photography. I could make statements, tell stories. If I hadn’t had that I would probably have been in the self-defence units like other guys.”
Soyo, Angola. Nine tough-looking kids on a dirt road. Eight have automatic weapons, the ninth looks back at the camera through military binoculars. Two days later Unita takes the town. Prisoners were locked in containers and left to die. The kids never came home.
For John Liebenberg the tough looks on the faces of the kids are masks of fear. “There is scaredness. The youngsters are forced into the army. They’re armed to the teeth, living very fragile lives.” Hence the masks. “It’s, ‘Fuck you. Don’t take pictures of me. Stop talking shit and give me some bread.’ Behind it all is just youngsters smoking zol.”
Another Liebenberg pic: a broken-down church in Huambo. In the foreground a stern-looking tank commander sits on the turret, AK-47 in hand. Church, power, gun. You can’t see that the commander has no legs.
“Nowadays he’s living in Benguela as a beggar,” Liebenberg says. “His tank got blown again and they kicked him out of the army. When people walk past him now some say, ‘You know why you lost your legs? Because you were an asshole when you had them.'”
The crumpled sea of Durban harbour. In the distance the city. We’re on a ferry heading out to a ship. Framed by the doorway are the legs and dress of a prostitute. A gust causes her dress to swirl. A Marilyn Monroe moment. Paul Weinberg takes a picture.
“It’s a 10-minute journey they all take, from dry land to boat,” says Weinberg. “They wear any number of masks to survive in their industry. She just stood there and made the picture for me.”
It’s 1988. In an area near the Transkei/ Lesotho border 21 ritual murders of kids occur within several months. Everyone is acutely aware of the murders, but life goes on.
Four kids walk smiling down a dirt track. One of them wears the sort of mask you’d expect to see in a Greek tragedy. According to photographer Guy Tillim the mask is of no significance. “The kid probably picked it up at the side of the road.” What he likes about the picture is the kids at play, seemingly ignorant of a darker presence. “Intention and outcome can be different,” he says, “but if a photograph conveys a sympathetic view, makes you comprehend a common thread, then it works.”
As a student during the early 1960s – and later a full-time photographer – David Goldblatt used to make it a rule to take a picture each time he found himself stationary in traffic. The result was just one accident, and a series of windows on a Johannesburg that no longer exists.
Then in 1973 he stopped in Pretoria Street and photographed a housepainter and his family sitting on their stoep. The house is long gone, the family too. What remains is an exquisite instant in time when sideburns were long, tattoos were original and the flag was orange, white and blue.
Fast-forward nearly a quarter of a century. Joubert Park. Kids watching an outdoor performance. A young girl turns and looks at the camera. A crudely drawn South African flag masks her face. Her eyes are calm, confident, knowing. The other kids continue to watch the performance. Motlhalefi Mahlabe takes a picture.
“Photography to me is what sound is to a musician,” says Mahlabe. “With music it’s about tone. With photography it’s how the picture strikes you.” A horrific car accident on the way to Grahamstown recently has changed the way he sees things. “The accident enhanced and redirected me. Very few people get a second chance in life. I want to live life properly, in such a way that I contribute positively to my community. Helping people to learn to see.”
South Photographs’s Mask exhibition features the work of Paul Alberts, Rodney Barnett, Jodi Bieber, David Goldblatt, Themba Hadebe, John Liebenberg, Motlhalefi Mahlabe, Jurgen Schadeberg, Guy Tillim, Graeme Williams and Paul Weinberg. It opens at the Bensusan Museum of Photography at MuseuMAfricA in Newtown, on November 21. Tel: (011) 833-5624
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