Santu Mofokeng began to dedicate himself to portraying everyday experience in South African townships in 1985, first as a member of the Afrapix collective, and then as a documentary photographer for the African Studies Institute at the University of the Witwatersrand. This set of publications, which continues a groundbreaking reappraisal of the photographer's archive, presents aspects of life in Soweto, where Mofokeng grew up; Dukathole, a township in the East Rand of Gauteng Province; and Johannesburg, the city in which he worked. Taken together, they invite a nuanced understanding of largely unsung narratives from a crucial period in South African history which saw the demise of apartheid.
Mr. Mofokeng produced some of the great pictures of the apartheid years, but his images were different from many others of the time. His interest was less in a photojournalistic documenting of battles between South African blacks and the repressive government, than in recording the dynamics of another front line: daily life in black communities.
