Zanele Muholi’s photo exhibit at SAM this last Thursday stopped
me in my tracks. Every photo didn’t just
cross my vision, every photo smacked me with rage, Zanele’s rage, Zanele’s
anger about the violence that her LGBTQ community in South Africa experiences
on a daily basis. You can see rage in
Zanele Muholi's eyes; in every self-portrait. Images scream out reflecting rage
about racist stereo types. And it’s a “Lesbian Photographer.”
Not just one photo but every self-portrait conveys this. Some more silent in the image, some so loud
you have to look away and when you do look away the image haunts you and you
have to work your way back around to that image because you can’t get it out of
your mind.
In a New York times interview Zanele Muholi said about her photography
“My practice as a visual activist looks at black resistance — existence
as well as insistence.” Most of Muholi’s previous work focused on
documenting and archiving black L.G.B.T. and gender nonconforming people of South Africa.
Her
new work “Somnyama Ngonyama, Hail the Dark Lioness” puts her self into the
fray, her whole self. Zanele Muholi takes everyday items, clothes pins, safety
pins, steel wool scrubbers, straws, and decorates herself in racist stereo types. But it’s the look on her face the stare in
her eyes that give the photos their sense of rage. It’s as if Zanele uses herself to convey all
the anger and rage of South African’s LGBTQ community pushing her audience to
that unsafe place where Zanele herself lives every day.
Feminist Nigerian writer, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie said of Zanele Muholi’s work “the
single story” — an invitation to the marginalized to take up space.” Zanele’s pushes her blackness unapologetically
confronting her audience.
Days later I can’t stop thinking of the images of Zanele
Muholi, of the violence experienced by LGBTQ community in South Africa, of
racism in the world. Watch Human Rights
Watch documentary on Zanele Muholi to learn more. https://www.hrw.org/video-photos/video/2013/11/22/zanele-muholi-visual-activist
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