Not many children from Soweto and Hillbrow get to take photographs of their lives and exhibit them in New York, London and top galleries in Johannesburg. But for children from Karabo Primary and Kwena Molapo High School in Soweto, many of whom come from informal settlements and have lost their parents to HIV/Aids, this has already happened, and is happening again.
The Umuzi Photo Club is holding its second Johannesburg exhibition, From eKasi, with love, at the Everard Read Gallery on Thursday. The photographs on sale are taken by some of the approximately 40 children who have been a part of Umuzi’s workshops, held over five weeks.
“At the workshops children learn how photography can be used as a tool for change,” says David Dini, founder of Umuzi. Dini left New York for South Africa a year ago and works as an analyst for a Johannesburg investment firm. “I knew I wanted to get involved in development work,” he says.
As the idea for Umuzi developed, Dini made an initial capital call back home and raised a few thousand dollars from individual donors over a couple of weeks. He then met a former executive of Kodak, who also founded the Snap Foundation in the United States, and who wrote a blank cheque for Umuzi to purchase disposable cameras.
Through mutual friends, Dini met fellow analyst Andrew Levy and Gilbert Pooley, and the group got in touch with Twenty30, an organisation that helped them identify schools to work with. So began the workshops.
The children are each given a disposable camera and over the space of a week take photographs based on their assignments. Come Saturdays, they assess their pictures with the trainers.
The pictures are of the children’s lives, of their homes and environments. When the question of voyeurism arises, Levy responds: “We are just getting people to see beyond the labourer coming to work and then going back into the abyss. A lot of people I know have never been to Soweto.”
“We teach the children visual literacy and critical thinking through photography,” says Dini. “We put them in a position where they have a portfolio and can apply for Wits Journalism and the Market Photo Workshop, for example.”
The money raised through the sales goes towards projects at the schools that Dini insists need to be sustainable, such as solar panels or a small business like a tuck shop.
The first exhibition, held two months ago, sold 60 prints, and this was followed by an exhibition in New York. The third one will be held on Thursday September 3 at the Everard Read Gallery in Rosebank and will be in conjunction with the Forest Town School for children with cerebral palsy.
Entry is R100, the proceeds of which will go to Forest Town, and the exhibition will include a wine tasting.