Of Soul and Joy: Exploring the tension between hope and illusion of the so-called ‘Born Free’ generation

© Sibusiso Bheka – Ekoneni, 2018

A building glows crimson. There is little to indicate where we are. No signage. No people. The image has a timeless quality. Peaceful, like some half-remembered dream drifting through the mind. What it shows, in fact, is a house illuminated red by the lights of an ambulance, attending to someone inside who has been the victim of violence.

“I often photograph scenes that seem serene or beautiful on the surface, but on closer inspection, reveal a deeper or darker reality,” explains Sibusiso Bheka, whose work, together with those of fellow South African photographer Tshepiso Mazibuko, feature in a joint exhibition titled Ubusukunemini (Day and Night) as part of PhotoSaintGermain photography festival in Paris. The pair are alumni of an initiative funded by Rubis Mécénat – the Rubis Group’s endowment fund – called Of Soul and Joy.

Thokoza, the township where both grew up, and where Of Soul and Joy has run since 2012, is a place of contrasts. Located just south east of Johannesburg, it is home to a population numbering 105,827, second only to Soweto in size. Established in the 1950s, it now faces its share of crime and poverty, but the community is tight-knit. “Townships have been looked at through a certain lens. Tshepiso and I aren’t offering that same perspective, images of townships which show only political or social issues,” says Bheka. “Instead of pushing you away, our work is inviting you in. You want to know more.” Nowhere is this quite so apparent than in lyrical portraits of Thokoza’s young residents, whose futures are yet to take shape.

I don’t identify with the label ‘born free’. Just because you were born after Apartheid doesn’t mean you don’t experience its effects indirectly

Sfiso Jodwana, for example, who fixes Bheka’s lens with a quiet intensity or an unnamed girl whose mirror reflection Mazibuko photographs in an interior room. That sense of tenderness, of care, that imbues these works is born of an insider’s view. Like the youths in their photographs, the photographers belong to the so-called ‘Born Free’ generation of individuals whose lives began after Apartheid’s fall. In 1994, the country’s first democratically elected government took power and the exhibition considers what that means in practice.

“For me, really great strides have been made in terms of democracy,” says Mazibuko, “but I don’t identify with the label ‘born free’. Just because you were born after Apartheid doesn’t mean you don’t experience its effects indirectly. That’s why we create the work we create because we find ourselves in the townships. It’s not necessarily physical bondage but it’s a bondage of the mind. In one street, you might find two taverns and many churches. It’s like you only have two points to run to: religion or alcohol.” .

Bheka sees in his work a “tension between hope and illusion”, a duality that characterises their generation. “What about the emotional, psychological and socio-economical scars of the past that are passed down through generations affecting how we navigate the world today?” He asks. “The trauma of previous generations doesn’t simply disappear. Yes we have freedom and rights, basic education and the right to vote but the journey toward true freedom is far from complete.”

Curator Valérie Fougeirol, previously director of Paris Photo and Magnum Gallery, worked with Mazibuko and Bheka over six months to interweave their work. In the intimate exhibition space, their images mingle, varying in scale, a visual conversation between two artists, between colour and monochrome, inside and outside, differing temporalities – Bheka takes most of his pictures after dark. The result is intended to create a feeling of immersion but also of blockage, like you can’t escape. “It’s one long sentence,” says Fougeirol. “If you know the photographers, you can recognise the work but we agreed that in the show we don’t say who is who.”

Fougeirol invited the pair to delve into their archives, presenting work from the past more than a decade alongside recent images. Mazibuko was struck by “the sameness” of the area. “It’s almost like you could have shot it yesterday, which speaks volumes about the pace of development in townships… But at the same time we can’t not see the beauty in it.It’s this specific eye that Sibusiso has that comes from being genuine. In that space, you forget about the underlying issues in the environment and you capture the humanity of the community.”

This is the third time that Fougeirol has worked with Of Soul and Joy, which trains a cohort of 20 young people in Thokoza annually in photography and other skills. It was how both Mazibuko and Bheka first seriously discovered the medium. “Photography became my refuge,” says Bheka, crediting it with shielding him from the substance misuse that is prevalent in townships. “It also empowered me as a person to tell my own story and about my own community.”

He adds: “The workshops were instrumental in my growth, expanding my network, and introducing me to new spaces that propelled my career forward.” Since their journeys began, both photographers have been making waves internationally, with exhibitions at Bamako Encounters, Les Rencontres des Arles, Ghent Photo Fest. Mazibuko has found in Of Soul and Joy something akin to family, “A platform where I can be myself and, frankly, I can be a free thinker. The project has embraced my ideas and supported me and.for that I am grateful.”

Nonetheless, both confess to a complicated relationship with photography. “Even when I don’t realise I’m photographing that way, my images have an element of sadness,” says Mazibuko. “But at the same time there is a connection. I believe that everyone I photograph I carry with me … Representation is my driving force. I want to create a beautiful archive of Black bodies that celebrates their life.” Bheka is troubled by the way that photography is always open to multiple interpretations. “Sometimes it doesn’t say what you want it to say. There’s always a conflict between what you experience and what you give out to the world,” he says.

The exhibition title, Ubusukunemini, is a compound, Fougeirol explains, made by merging two Zulu words: ubusuku, meaning ‘night’ and nemini, meaning ‘day’. The bringing together of what might seem distinct into a whole is a way of presenting Thokoza, its layers of history, present and future, in one space and holding that in all of its complexity, all of its poetry. 

Ubusukunemini (Day and Night) is at Rubis Mécénat hors-les-murs 10 rue Jacob, 75006, Paris, from October 30 to November 23, 2024