BALLEN was born in New York in 1950, and has lived in Johannesburg, South Africa, for nearly thirty years. Working as a geologist, Ballen began to photograph the homes and white residents of rural South Africa before developing his more theatrical and expressive style in the late-1990s.
Self-Portrait series, 2007-2013
Makhubu has established herself as one of the new generation of lens based artists to explore issues of identity, culture, land, rights, economy and religion. Her acclaimed series, Self-Portrait Project alludes to the continued alienation and estrangement in an era where the focus is inclined toward self and individual identity as opposed to collective and communal life. One of the canonical meanings that Achille Mbembe (2002: 241) argues can be attributed to slavery and colonialism (as well as Apartheid) is dispossession, a process in which juridical and economic procedures have led to material expropriation. Makhubu’s latest series The Flood has received deserved critical acclaim. It marks a departure from her previous work, shifting from the personal to the public.
Contemporary Photography Index 