Life Itself

Photography and South Africa

Simon A. Clarke

$79.99

Hardback

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English

Reaktion Books
01 June 2025

Photographic reportage; African history

Charting the photographic history of South Africa from colonialism to democracy, from early European photographers to work today by young South Africans, Life Itself explores how people, events and places have been depicted in photographic images over the decades. Featuring images from the heyday of Drum magazine and Black emergence to Peter Magubane's Soweto uprising pictures, David Goldblatt's In Boksburg and the photographers' collective Afrapix, as well as the struggles for freedom, the book carefully documents the visual representation of the nation. Simon A. Clarke concludes with post-apartheid documentary and art photography in the work of Andrew Tshabangu, Lindokuhle Sobekwa and others. Superbly illustrated, Life Itself helps to fill a gap in our understanding of the role of the camera in South African society over time.

'Life Itself is likely to be the most important book ever published on the history of South African photography. Simon A. Clarke's text is elucidating and the well-chosen photographs for the book are aesthetic and documentary at the same time.'

Roger Ballen, artist/photographer

By: Simon A. Clarke
Imprint: Reaktion Books
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 250mm, Width: 190mm,
ISBN: 9781836390428
ISBN 10: 1836390424
Pages: 256
Publication Date: 01 June 2025
Audience: College/higher education , Further / Higher Education
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Simon A. Clarke is Senior Lecturer at Falmouth University. His previous books include Print: Fashion, Interiors, Art (2014). He has undertaken photography fieldwork and research in South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania, Zanzibar and Madagascar.

Reviews for Life Itself: Photography and South Africa

Life Itself is likely to be the most important book ever published on the history of South African photography. Simon A. Clarke’s text is elucidating and the well-chosen photographs for the book are aesthetic and documentary at the same time. * Roger Ballen, artist/photographer * Throughout Clarke’s photographic history of struggle is inserted contextual writing telling the terrible story of the development of apartheid and its increasing repression . . . Clarke approaches the subject with a critical and historical lens, analysing photography as both an artistic expression and a socio-political tool . . . an outstanding study of how images have shaped narratives of identity, resistance and power in South Africa. -- Bob Newland * Morning Star *