In conversation with Zwelethu Mthethwa
by Sean O'Toole
In mid-March this year, a week before the triumphant opening of his Sugar Cane series in New York, at the Jack Shainman gallery, photographer Zwelethu Mthethwa agreed to a telephonic interview. Although besieged by a head cold, he nonetheless managed to sustain an hour-long conversation in which the acclaimed Cape Town photographer openly discussed his influences, his thoughts on the publication Shack Chic, the South African artworld and his latest project.
Where do you place yourself as a photographer in the South African context?
The way I see myself is different to the norm in the sense that I started photography at a university. I studied fine art, which had very little to do with journalism. I also studied printmaking, painting, sculpture and design. It fed me different information compared to photographers who come out of the journalistic practice. The way that I work is also very different; I work for myself. That means I can do whatever I think is interesting.
Also, if I choose a subject that I feel doesn't work I can stop abruptly or manoeuvre myself differently. I can also take as long as I want before I can say I am done. I don't have to rush to finish. Because of these advantages, my work tends to look at things very differently. There is no outside pressure pushing me to finish. Everything comes from me.
Were there any individuals that sparked your imagination during your time at university?
Oh yes, I remember David Goldblatt coming to Michaelis, at the University of Cape Town, and looking at our work. He was certainly an influence.
And beyond photography? I ask this because your work often expresses a deep love for colour.
When I studied at Michaelis they did not have colour facilities. Then I won a Fulbright Scholarship and went to Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT). The headquarters of Kodak are situated right there. At RIT we had 22 colour darkrooms as well as nine black-and-white labs to ourselves. That was when I started to study colour.
When I looked at the work that I shot before I went to the USA, work I had started in 1984 already, I was shocked. I was shocked that my worked seemed to perpetuate the myth that poor people are miserable and down-and-out. The history of black-and-white as a medium, as well as the angst it lends to an image, gave nothing to the images. The photographs missed the colour context.
At RIT I also realised that the mythology of black-and-white photography is attached to a political agenda, which is used for both good and bad. I decided I would employ colour to represent the colour of the places my subjects inhabited. Colour is just so beautiful. When you see beauty you think less of poverty. You think of design and composition. Colour really forces you to look at things that way. That was 1991.
When I returned to Cape Town, I choose to document a small informal settlement outside Paarl. I first worked with the artist Willie Bester, who was also taking photographs, and a principal who was well known in the area. I wanted people to be comfortable with my presence.
Do you mean to imply that a photographer has an ethical responsibility to his/ her subject matter?
A question I have long asked myself is would I want to be photographed in the contexts I chose. Right from the outset I gave people photographs. I want people to be comfortable with how they are seen. That is very important for me. I think I feel very comfortable when people are happy with how I have portrayed them.
Looking at your township studies, for instance, and I think here particularly of the unpopulated interiors, how do you feel about the publication of books such as Shack Chic? They seem to have essentially appropriated your style.
I am very angry. As I said earlier, David Goldblatt is a big influence. These people [the authors of Shack Chic] see it as some sort of fashion statement. They don't understand the dynamic behind what I shot as well as the time I invested to find out what is going on. They jump in because they see an opportunity to make money. Looking at Shack Chic, the gaze that the viewer has is questionable. To show someone laughing immediately raises the point in photography about people wearing masks. I believe there are barriers that these commercial photographers might not be aware of.
Looking at your own studies from the townships, one thing I observed was that you possess a romantic eye, teasing out poetry and beauty in places that not many people would look to find it.
A professor once told me that a work of art should have rhythm like a song or a story. Unlike news images, fine art photographs are about composition colour, texture, proportion, light, a lot of other things that will captivate the audience. It's about having layers and layers that make it work.
This leads me to your Sugar Cane series. How did this project come about?
My brother bought a farm in Umzinto, which is south of Durban. I went there to visit him and he showed me around the farm. I saw that the men harvesting the sugar cane were wearing long skirts and had fancy hairdos. Their wrists had pieces of cloth wrapped around them. They looked very funky to me. With the machetes they carry I saw samurai warriors. For me it is not strange for a black person to think of samurai warriors because of my history of images.
It reminded me of my youth watching movies and reading comic books on weekends. The layering of the clothes also reminded me of the high fashion in Paris. I knew these were simply subjective insights. When I spoke with the people I found out that the baggy clothing served a purpose, to protect their bodies from the sugar cane leaves.
I saw that you published some black-and-white versions in the magazine Chimurenga. Thye depicted the same men but without showing their heads. Are these from a different series?
They were photographed in colour but I allowed the magazine to reproduce them in black-and-white because they could not afford colour. The cropping was a strategy I employed early on, to demystify the actual person or subject. During the editing, I spoke with many people who suggested that cropping would not work as an entire series.
Looking at your most recent work, of worshippers, what attracted you to this subject?
It is something I started a while back. It has two parts. I am looking at the Shembe Church in Durban, as well as Christian Zionists in Johannesburg.
This is not new subject matter photographically. Andrew Tshabangu, for instance, has looked at aspects of black spirituality.
Religion is very intriguing. It is part of my culture. In the townships, the Christian Zionists do not have money to build churches so they have to be very creative with the way that they worship. This intrigues me because I think they are quite creative. I remember distinctly that if the Christian Zionists were having a prayer session next door, you wouldn't be able to sleep. They would bang the drum the whole night. As a kid I had a relationship with that.
I do think, though, that my interests differ from that of Andrew Tshabangu. What interests me is how they have moved and redefined their space, and how the city is used. It interests me that you get multi-users of urban spaces, such as for instance a park in a suburban area doubling up as a place of worship.
It is not really about spirituality but rather about how they have defined a space that they use. Almost all the spaces they use are not permanent places of worship. I have documented churchgoers using schools on weekends to pray. What interests me is the fact that more than one community uses the space.
I want to raise the issue of race as it pertains to the South African artworld. Can you share your thoughts on this subject?
Before we get there I would like to point out that I have two international agents, one in New York and the other in Italy. In South Africa, I have worked with Linda Givon, in Johannesburg. Still, my work is predominantly bought overseas. My work is only in about four collections locally.
We can talk about race but the prejudices in the South African artworld go beyond race. It has a lot to do with whom you associate yourself with. If you do not fit into certain camps you don't get promoted. Certainly there is a racial element, but I think it goes beyond race. Maybe we have incompetent people in high positions. There is that possibility.
How would characterise your relationship with the South African art community?
It is a difficult one. Take the DaimlerChrysler Art Award. When I was told that I had been shortlisted I told them that I wasn't sure if I wanted to participate. I told them I didn't trust the judges, or whether they knew anything about creative photography. I also said I had a problem with the word 'creative'. It left me in a difficult position because if I had declined I would have been seen as someone who is very arrogant. So I accepted, but I knew that I would never win. The judges did not know what fine art photography was.
Does it ever worry you, about your career abroad, that you might sometimes be invited to participate on shows not on the basis of your output as an individual but rather because of the demographic you represent, a black, Zulu male South African?
I remember when I started I did African shows, or black shows. Now I don't do them simply because I see myself as an image-maker. The colour of my skin is secondary. I subscribe to what Spike Lee says: 'Fuck those who only see me as a black person'. [Laughs]. I do wrestle with it though.
If someone had to ask me as an African person, or a black person, what really influenced me to show that I am a black person, besides my locality I would have to say that I don't know. When I look at the Sugar Cane series, for instance, it is not about black people. Sugar is an international commodity. The work is about a certain class of people that could be any race.
