Santu Mofokeng
Santu Mofokeng (1956) is a South African news photographer who works under the alias Mofokengâ. Mofokeng is a member of the Afrapix collective and has won a Prince Claus Award.[1]
Career
Mofokeng was born in 1956 in Soweto, Johannesburg. While still a teenager, he began his career as a street photographer, went on to work as an assistant in a darkroom, and then he became a news photographer. Subsequently he joined the collective Afrapix; he works under the alias Mofokengâ. Initially he documented mainly the struggle against apartheid in South Africa.[1]
Mofokeng is known to be able to rearrange conventional subjection in a photographic presentation with a spiritual dimension; an example of this is Chasing Shadows from 1997.[citation needed] After starting off with street and news photography, he specialized in landscapes. In his images he presents them in relation to ownership, power, ecological effects and memory, but avoids an open political expression. His work shows his deep concern for the condition of the (biophysical) environment at the beginning of the 21st century.[2][3][4]
At his exhibition Let's Talk in 2010, he explained that the essence is not what you see in these photographs, but what you don't see (but feel).[5]
Solo exhibitions
- 1990: Like Shifting Sand, Market Galleries, Johannesburg[citation needed]
- 1994: Rumours / The Bloemhof Portfolio, Market Galleries, Johannesburg[citation needed]
- 1995: Distorting Mirror/Townships Imagined, Worker´s Library, Johannesburg[citation needed]
- 1997: Chasing Shadows - Gertrude Posel Gallery, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg[citation needed]
- 1998: Black Photo Album/Look At Me, Netherlands Photo Institute, Rotterdam[citation needed]
- 1998: Chasing Shadows, Netherlands Photo Institute, Rotterdam[citation needed]
- 1998: Lunarscapes, Netherlands Photo Institute, Rotterdam[citation needed]
- 1999: Black Photo Album/Look At Me, FNAC Montparnasse[citation needed]
- 2000: Chasing Shadows, Transparencies International, Berlin[citation needed]
- 2000: Sad Landscapes, Camouflage Gallery, Johannesburg[citation needed]
- 2003: Chasing Shadows, Memling Museum, Bruges[citation needed]
- 2004: Rethinking Landscape, Centre photographique d'Ile-de-France (CPIF), Pontault-Combault[citation needed]
- 2004: Santu Mofokeng, David Krut Projects, New York City[citation needed]
- 2004: Santu Mofokeng, Gallery MOMO, Johannesburg[citation needed]
- 2006: Invoice Iziko, South African National Art Museum, Cape Town[citation needed]
- 2007: Invoice, Standard Bank Art Museum, Johannesburg[citation needed]
- 2008: Homeland Security, Johannesburg Art Museum[citation needed]
- 2008: Santu Mofokeng’s Landscape, Warren Siebrits, Johannesburg[citation needed]
- 2009: Mofokeng survey exhibition, Autograph ABP, London[citation needed]
- 2010: Chasing Shadows, Anne Arbor Institute of Humanities, Michigan[citation needed]
- 2010: Let’s Talk, Arts on Main, Johannesburg[citation needed]
- 2010: Remaining Past, Minshar Art Institute, Tel Aviv[citation needed]
- 2011-12: Chasing Shadows, Paris, Bern, Bergen, Antwerp[6]
Awards
- 1991: Ernest Cole Scholarship, for study at the International Center of Photography, in New York City[citation needed]
- 1992: 1st Mother Jones Award for Africa[citation needed]
- 1998: Künstlerhaus Worpswede Fellowship, Germany[citation needed]
- 1999: Contre Jour Residency, Marseille[citation needed]
- 1999: DAAD Fellowship, Worpswede, Germany[citation needed]
- 2001: DAAD Fellowship, Worpswede, Germany[citation needed]
- 2007: Ruth First Fellowship[citation needed]
- 2009: Prince Claus Award, Netherlands[1]
- 2016: International Photography Prize, Fondazione Fotografia Modena - Sky Arte, Italy[citation needed]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Prince Claus Fund (2009) biography
- ↑ Luirink, Bart (April 10, 2010) blog, ZAM Africa Magazine (Dutch)
- ↑ Cargo Collective, biography
- ↑ Cargo Collective, Chasing Shadows
- ↑ Teeffelen, Walter van (2010) biography (Dutch)
- ↑ De Buren, hasing Shadows. Santu Mofokeng, Thirty Years of Photographic Essays (Dutch)
