(Nelson Mandela Square - Day of
Reconciliation - Sandton City, Johannesburg. Chromogenic Print)
The inaugural Ernest Cole Award Exhibition
will open at KZNSA Gallery this evening (October 2) This will include the book
launch of the first winner of the award, Cape Town-based documentary
photographer Dale Yudelman.
The Ernest Cole Photographic Award has been
established to stimulate creative work in photography in southern Africa. The
award, initiated by the UCT Libraries with support from the Kirsh, Peter Brown,
Gavin Relly Trusts and Orms, has been named after the documentary photographer,
Ernest Cole. The emphasis of the award is on creative responses to South
African society. The winner of the inaugural award is Dale Yudelman and his
book, Life under Democracy, is the
first in a series of annual publications to be published under the auspices of
this award.
Ernest Cole was born in South Africa in
1940 and received his first camera as a gift from a clergyman. Before leaving
the country in the mid 1960s he worked as a photojournalist for Drum magazine,
sharing a darkroom with photographer Struan Robertson. On his own initiative,
Cole undertook a comprehensive photographic essay in which he showed what it
meant to be black under apartheid. The
House of Bondage was published in New York in 1967 and was immediately banned
in South Africa. Sadly, he never returned to South Africa and died in exile in
New York in 1990 just after the release of Nelson Mandela and the unbanning of
the ANC and other liberation organisations.
In contrast to Cole’s work, Yudelman’s
project is shot on an iphone and explores the life of ordinary South Africans
today. His journey takes us from the streets of Johannesburg to the surrounds
of Hout Bay, Cape Town; from protests to parliament, from the poor to the rich and
famous.
The series of photographs,Life under Democracy, was inspired by
the Ernest Cole exhibition at the National Gallery in Cape Town, in February
2011. Cole’s images feature life under apartheid.
Yudelman’s series looks at life under
democracy and where we are after 18 years of liberation.
Many of the images were shot in passing and
are personal daily reflections – while others involve more deliberate excursions.
In Life under Democracy, Yudelman
returns to the areas he photographed in the 80’s, for the series, Suburbs in Paradise, which
cross-examines white suburbia under the influence of legislated segregation. To
gain perspective, he also visits some of the people and areas Cole
photographed. A sense of how much has changed begins to develop; and in some
cases how much has stayed the same. As if in conversation, Yudelman uses his
iPhone camera as a means of discourse. The senses are unified through a device,
historically utilised for discussion, in turn, mirroring the merging of a
nation whose past is omnipresent.
Yudelman’s work is a consequence of a
studied eye, brokered over 30 years of ceaseless image making. Enthralled with
the many-layered dimensions of reality, his images are a manifestation of how
modern photography is able to escape the bounds of the ‘record’, creating an
authentic and evocative account of recent times.
Life
under Democracy will be officially opened by photographer
Paul Weinberg at 18h00
tonight (October 2) and runs in the KZNSA’s Main, Mezzanine & Park Contemporary Galleries until
October 21.
The KZNSA Gallery is situated at 166 Bulwer Road,
Glenwood, Durban. More information from Emme Young on 031 277 1705 or
email: gallery@kznsagallery.co.za
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