2014 ; Read any news story about immigrants in South Africa and it’ll probably be about xenophobic attacks. But there’s another side to relations with South Africans, a softer side, which is what photographer Sydelle Willow Smith portrays in “Soft Walls”.
Cape Town. As a street art piece by Tokolos Stencil Collective so aptly proclaimed recently, ‘This City works for a few’ – in stark contrast to the popular political refrain, ‘This city works for all’. But on a neglected concrete wall opposite Garden’s Centre shopping mall in the inner-city, some unknown soul has diligently etched the phrase ‘Cape Town city of love’. The words are accompanied by juvenile-like stick figure etchings of iconic Cape Town markers like Table Mountain and Protea flowers. I’m sure all those who have suffered death-by-burning-tyre or been systematically made to feel alien and unwelcome on Cape Town’s soil would beg to differ with this idealistic phrase. Cape Town – and other South African towns and cities – were, after all, sites of severe xenophobic attacks in 2008, resulting in many dead bodies and a swelling sense of hate and antagonism between locals and those from further afield in Africa. This divisive behaviour persists but, as talented local photographer (who snapped the ‘Cape Town city of love’ image) Sydelle Willow Smith has recently shown, some African immigrants have permeated this unnecessary divide.
City of Love. (© Sydelle Willow Smith)
“We do not want them here. We had a life before they arrived and will cope just fine without them”
Intimate stories
Smith’s first solo exhibition, Soft Walls, recently opened at the prestigious Market Photo Workshop in Newtown, Johannesburg. Her desire was to create a body of work that would “explore intimate stories of the lived experiences of people from other countries in Africa who are making homes/lives/family/belonging with local South Africans – defying the prejudice and preconceived notions of xenophobia towards immigrants.” In so doing, Smith demonstrated Cape Town’s potential to be a ‘City of love’.
The people she photographed embody immigrants transcending beyond the all too familiar guise of ‘foreign’ spaza shop owner or ‘foreign’ car guard – the very external individuals we often see in public spaces yet seldom engage with. The photographs transport observers into living rooms, bedrooms and work environments of foreign nationals capturing everyday activities like shopping, watching television, speaking on the phone, hanging pictures and preparing for a wedding. In doing so, Smith shows immigrants navigating the ‘us’ and ‘them’ divide through convivial relationships with South Africans. “In this body of work, rather than focus on the insider/outsider dichotomy of foreigner and local I wanted to engage with stories of people living together across nationality lines,” explained Smith.
An intimate moment – getting ready for a wedding. Photographs like this permeate the public vs private divide, showing immigrants to be real people, living very real lives (© Sydelle Willow Smith)
Rejecting the “Rainbow nation”
Poignantly, Smith’s work rejects the post-apartheid politically correct buzz-phrase, ‘Rainbow nation’. Reflecting on the widespread xenophobic attacks in 2008 (in which over 60 people were killed), Smith says, “In a single month notions such as ‘rainbow nation’ and ‘South Africa belongs to all those that live in it’ were dismantled” and, six years on, “xenophobic tensions have lingered.” Smith explains the need to re-frame the ingrained rainbow nation rhetoric: “I am interpreting a new landscape beyond the rainbow – as the colours of a rainbow do not mix – where foreigners and South Africans fall in love, have children, build homes together, and become friends who camouflage their cultural distinctness or ‘exoticness’ to fit in, rather than stand out.”
Dillion S. Phiri (born in Zimbabwe to a Zimbabwean mother and Malawian father) and Nokulunga Mateta-Phiri in Mandalay, Khayelitsha. Nationality does not bother Dillon, as even at “home” in Zimbabwe he is considered foreign. (Photo © Sydelle Willow Smith).
Alternative to xenophobia
Xenophobic violence is not simply a select 2008 phenomenon – just two weeks ago, newspaper headlines declared ‘Xenophobia has set Refilwe on fire’. More than 60 shops owned by foreign nationals in Refilwe, a township near Cullinan in Gauteng, were looted. One protestor was unapologetically against the presence of foreign nationals. “We do not want them here. We had a life before they arrived and will cope just fine without them,” he said. His sentiment is not unique in the slightest. Ibrahim Shuriye, head of community safety for the Somali Association SA, has aired his concerns at the irony of immigrants fleeing their own war-torn motherlands to seek refuge in democratic South Africa, only to fear for their lives again. “Xenophobic attacks are happening daily, and we would like to appeal to the government for protection. The situation cannot continue like this,” he said.
“Because you in a foreign land doesn’t mean you can’t make your shit happen.”
Some may criticise Smith for glossing over this and seeking the simple ‘happy’ stories instead, but as she explained, she is not denying the existence of persistent xenophobia; her work seeks to acknowledge this but also to demonstrate the possibility – and importantly, the existence – of convivial alternatives: “For this project I am not trying to do a PR piece for ‘rainbow nation’ happy melting pot South Africa,” instead, Soft Walls was borne out of a desire to “explore alternative narratives.”
One such alternative narrative is that of Dino Estevo, a once successful soccer player from Mozambique. One of the most powerful images on exhibit is the simple image of a small rock on some gritty sand surrounded by a few haphazard neglected plants. The caption ‘Where Dino slept’ is immediately arresting – instilling in the viewer the knowledge that Dino, like many other immigrants, used to sleep under a bridge, exposed to the raw Cape Town-underbelly. But Smith’s coverage of Dino shows a persistent and hard working man who, given the opportunity to coach soccer at the African Brothers Football Academy, has assimilated into life in Cape Town – a life of no longer being the Mozambican sleeping under bridges. As Dillion, another individual photographed by Smith, explained, “Because you in a foreign land doesn’t mean you can’t make your shit happen.”
Dino, from Mozambique, used to sleep under a bridge in Cape Town. Now, he coaches soccer to young South Africans (© Sydelle Willow Smith)
Asked if the people photographed are the exceptions rather than the norm when it comes to transcending xenophobia in South Africa, Smith responded: “The people I photographed for this project are not examples of anything, they are people living their own lives, their own complexities, they experience conviviality, they experience stigma and xenophobic attitude – their lives are their lives, full of hope and strife and the realities of life.” Dino sleeping under a bridge being case in point – a life full of hope and strife. Smith explained that Soft Walls is not a bubble-gum candy-flossed glossing over of real issues, hence the decision to include photographs such as ‘Where Dillion slept’. “That is why the project does not only portray positive images, there are subtle tensions, there are quiet moments reflecting the human experiences of making home and place that come with moments of light and dark,” explained Smith.
‘Where Dino Slept.’ (© Sydelle Willow Smith)
Many of the photographs taken in homes revealed the tendency to prominently display family photographs in intimate spaces such as lounges and bedrooms. Perhaps this reminder of family further afield offers a sense of connection to the lives many African immigrants have left behind, the roots with their motherlands severed. Perhaps they derive a sense of comfort from the familiar yet distance faces staring down at them as they navigate their new lives. Smith touched on this trend, nothing that her photographs too may one day take the cherished prominent wall space in small lounges and bedrooms, but instead of being a marker of something distant or lost, she hopes her photographs will be a sign of something gained – a life in South Africa.
“My hope is for these photographs to become memories, future nostalgic reminisces for those photographed – archives of their existence that declare they are alive – hung up and framed in their living rooms as testaments to their triumph of having made home for themselves in new spaces,” Smith explains.
“Koura at Home in Maitland. Koura is 13 and was born in South Africa, her father is from Ivory Coast and her mother is from Mali, she has never left the country,” reads Smith’s caption. Although born in South Africa, Smith says Koura is often met with name calling and discrimination against foreigners. (© Sydelle Willow Smith)
Soft Walls investigates the walls that divide – walls that create an ‘us’ and ‘them’ mentality towards immigrants instead of encouraging a cohesive assimilation. “Nuanced, abstracted poetic stories that reflect on nostalgia, home-making, belonging – alternative lenses to xenophobia – like Soft Walls are also necessary as they offer alternative dialogues, spaces of hope of celebration of the human spirit in ‘the messiness and rawness of everyday life’ of individuals,” explained Smith. Let’s hope that these walls that divide – be they real or imaginary – will be rendered soft in the future.
The not-to-be-missed exhibition, featuring bold, professional, colourful photographs capturing in-situ real raw life moments of immigrants and South Africans in convivial relationships and friendships is currently being exhibited at the Market Photo Workshop until 2 April 2014. Thereafter, the exhibition will travel to Cape Town. Smith was the first recipient of the Gisèle Wulfsohn Mentorship – Soft Walls is her consequent body of work.
Visit Sydelle Willow Smith’s websitewww.sydellewillowsmith.com to view more of her documentary photography.
Hey
ReplyDeleteenjoyed your take on the work
Thankyou
Sydelle