Photo-archives from Apartheid-era South Africa head to auction

By Siddhi Jain

New Delhi, Feb 29 (SocialNews.XYZ) An archive of images taken from the photographer's studio of Z.J.S Ndimande and Sons in Greytown during Apartheid, a system of racial segregation practised in colonial South Africa, will go under the hammer at an auction.

Global auction house Bonhams will sell some of these historically-important studio portraits in London on March 18.

The studio, which opened in 1940, was later forbidden from operating under the owner's name as Greytown (now the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa) was considered a white district during the regime. The 1,126 loose images and four albums of men, women and children posing for Ndimande in his studio have an estimate of 6,000-9,000 pounds.

Z.J.S Ndimande began his family-run photography studio in the 1940s with his son, Richard Ndimande, who later took over the business from his father in 1968. The studio was located on the corner of Bell Street and York Street, attached to the family's hairdressing business in Greytown.

However, in 1968, the government implemented a policy of 'resettlement', and the studio was forced to leave town under the regulations of the Group Areas Act; a parliamentary act which assigned racial groups to different residential and business sections in urban areas.

Richard's studio relocated to a semi-rural township outside Greytown called Enhlalagahe but here the business struggled. Crime in Enhlalagahe was rife and customers were required to get a permit to visit the town. It was here in Richard's studio in the '70s that this series of striking black and white photographs were taken.

It may be noted that the first post-apartheid elections were held in South Africa in 1994.

"Richard Ndimande's pictures were taken under circumstances of duress. But they have a pride and self-assertion to them that belies the context within which they were produced. Within the confines of the studio a state of utopia reigns, free from the politics of race and space that governed daily life for black South Africans," Journalist, broadcaster and curator, Ekow Eshun, said.

After 15 years, in 1983, Richard decided to move the business back to Greytown, this time under the new official ownership of the white cover name, Frederick (Bob) Harris. It was then that Richard switched from using black and white to colour film.

"Photographic studios in apartheid South Africa were one of the few outlets where people could express themselves. This extremely rare archive of images offers a glimpse at the fun and creative flair that remained within ordinary life, even under such difficult circumstances," Bonhams Modern and Contemporary African Art specialist, Helene Love-Allotey, said.

(Siddhi Jain can be contacted at siddhi.j@ians.in)

Source: IANS