Umhlabathi is home to those who use photography—at times, an oppressive tool used for the surveillance of Black people—as a tool to document and grant the stories of Black people space, time, and respect.
In Johannesburg—which rests on land that has long been held in colonial hands and where ownership of land is only for the few—Umhlabathi seeks to create a place for sustainable and equitable growth, where arts education, resources, and creative space exist for the benefit of the many.
In a place like Johannesburg, where many have come to try and build a meaningful life, photography is labour. In the same way that the soil’s fertility depends on the laborious task of cultivation by dedicated hands, documenting the lives of the unseen labour force of Johannesburg requires the same sense of diligence. Each photographer in Umhlabathi Collective uncovers stories that make up the fabric of South African society, but which often go unacknowledged. For instance, when we speak about the impact of capitalism on the land, we tend to leave out the stories of the vulnerable people who are forced to work under harrowing conditions. Umhlabathi Collective exists to tell these stories, which we’re so often prevented from hearing.
The work of Umhlabathi is a considerable archive of the history of labouring in Johannesburg. The work—presented as part of the 2021 Joburg Arts Alive Festival and developed in conversation with independent curator, Thato Mogotsi—will be shown at the Umhlabathi Gallery in Newtown. The exhibition, which runs from November 26th to December 13th, 2021, is titled Vul’ Umhlabathi, which loosely translates to mean ‘open up the land’.
This exhibition consists of works that engage the idea of Johannesburg as a home where inhabitants grow roots. The work reflects everything from the unnamed labourers who built a city of gold to Johannesburg’s largely inaccessible wealth and prosperity. The exhibition and public talk will foreground the role that photography plays in archiving and humanising the Black lived experience in South Africa, despite the historical erasure perpetuated by oppressive systems.
We disrupt the land to build, to sow, and to extract its yield and partake in the fruits it bears. Perhaps this act of disruption by Umhlabathi, which aims to transform the way photography is created and consumed in Africa, is necessary for the growth of a new kind of labour in Africa and beyond—a labour that allows for true equality to be realised.