Magubane, The Eye of Africa

“It was through the eyes,
the courage and the pen of blacks
that the whole world could see
Soweto on fire.”
(Peter Magubane)

 

“Student arrested in front of the Johannesburg Supreme Court”, 1976. (c)Peter Magubane

 

Unfortunately, the violence suffered by the African American population has returned to the news these days, with cities around the world in revolt over the killings of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25 and Rayshard Brooks in Atlanta, this week, by the police, during the arrest phases.

As tide arose the protest cry in America, and beyond, against the racial inequalities that sounded absurd in the times of apartheid and are even more so nowadays.

 

This is not what I want to talk to you about, because it is already in every news, let alone apartheid, the South African racial segregation laws in force from 1948 to 1991.

I'm not a politician or activist.

 

But all these events brought to mind the story of a photographer, and since I love to talk about this and I think it's appropriate in these days, I want to introduce you to Peter Magubane, not very famous but whose life is exemplary and tells of how things have not changed so much.

 

“Funeral of a 13-year-old boy, first victim of the 1976 riots”. (c)Peter Magubane

Magubane was born in Johannesburg in 1932 and soon became passionate about photography, with the dream of being able to collaborate with the magazine “Drum”, a sort of “Life” of South Africa, slang and rowdy but capable of giving voice to black Africa .

He managed to get into the editorial staff of the magazine and practice in photography: he wanted to be one of the top photographers.

“In those days – the 1950s – photojournalism was an absolute novelty for black people. When the opportunity arose, however, we knew how to do it better,” says Magubane. And his career began precisely with the entry into force of apartheid.

 

His first assignment for “Drum” was the 1955 convention of the African National Congress. Since then he understood that it was his destiny: to photograph and document to give voice to the African people, to the point of sleeping in the editorial office, to send their marriage to pieces, and to risk his life many times; not to mention all the circumstances in which he was arrested and beaten by the police for his work that bothered him greatly.

 

“Peter Magubane arrested”, 1958. Photo by Jurgen Schadeberg

It can be said that, most probably, Magubane was one of the most battered photographers in the history of photography, without – fortunately – reaching death, as happened for the great Eugene Smith, of whom I have already spoken.

“Once upon a time there was a major political trial in Zeerust and the press was forbidden to report on its progress. We decided instead that the service would do it, both for the record and for the photographs. In the end, we thought to hide a Leica IIIG, with previously set wide angle, in a half loaf. Pretending to eat my bread, I photographed two scenes: the entry of the defendants into the courtroom and the updating of the hearing. When I could no longer continue this trick, I hid the machine in a milk carton and resumed photographing.”

Another time, he hid a small camera in the cut pages of a Bible, always to get around the press bans.

 

It was thanks to this passion that in 1958 he became the first black South African photographer to win Best Press picture of the year, a photography contest for South African news.

And also to be able to meet and photograph Nomzamo Mandela, the wife of Nelson Mandela, in prison and his 4-year-old daughter Zinzi.

 

“Nomzamo Mandela”. (c)Peter Magubane

But also to enter and exit prisons.

Until the most terrible moment of his life, when in 1970 he was forced into confinement for five years, without being able to photograph and almost risking madness.

“You are no longer a human being, people avoid you, it is as if you have leprosy,”  he wrote. He will be forced to invent new jobs, he will sell carpets, clothes, furniture.

But the police didn't leave him in peace. In 1971 he was arrested again, interrogated in a cell with his hands and ankles chained to a pole. He was imprisoned 98 days in solitary confinement, concentrating on singing birds to keep his mind.

It took him a year to go back to photography, and again in the midst of the riots, the clashes, with the riots of Soweto in 1976: with the city on fire and the people killed on the street by police fire. He was beaten again, the agents broke his nose, but in spite of everything, in 1976 he won the prestigious prize of the Enterprising Journalism Award, the highest South African journalistic award.

 

“Woman mourning her husband burned alive in Soweto”, 1976 (c)Peter Magubane

“Hand of a black child”, 1968 (c)Peter Magubane

In 1977 he moved to New York where he still lives, returning other times to his country, even if the South African authorities still refuse to issue him  a press card. He married again with a United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Lusaka, Zambia, and published many books.

 

Magubane will not go down in history as one of the Masters of Photography, but certainly his social commitment and his life have been examples of how passion can become the design of an entire existence, even at the risk of the same.

It's an example to understand how, although the world has made progress, the mentality of many people has remained anchored to that period and to those photographs.

For this reason, I wanted to tell his story, so that the symbols of lives that were beaten and imprisoned but never stopped screaming their protest and their demand for equality could be raised to the statues demolished in America.

 

“Women charged by the police” Johannesburg, 1958 (c)Peter Magubane

“Young people throw stones at the police after the death of a companion” 18 June, 1976 (c)Peter Magubane

Even with a click inside a loaf.

 

“I don't know what will happen to me later. I will continue to work in South Africa, taking the best possible photographs. I hope they are not all images of violence. Yet as long as there is no dialogue between the government of South Africa and the black population there will be no respite from violence. As long as the government is not willing to recognize black as a citizen and grant him all his rights in his native country, I see no change except for the worst. Black people don't want to throw white people overboard. Whites and blacks must share the fruits of the country on an equal footing.”

 

Peter Magubane. Photographed by A. Lenora Tait

 

For information on the life of Magubane I used the writings of John G. Morris on: “Peter Magubane” - The Great Photographers (Fabbri Publishing Group, 1982)

Recommended movie: 21 Icons : Peter Magubane : Short Film

Italian version