Mixedness is my Mythology

My family sits in a grey space where we deconstruct the apartheid construction of ‘colouredness’ and make it our own. Identity is personal and ours is undefined and undetermined as it incorporates multiple backgrounds thus inspiring me to make work with my family. The conscious choice of black-and-white analogue photography refers to the historical anthropological inhumane images of people of colour in South Africa that were used to support ideas on race and legalised oppression. Being neither black nor white, a person of colour is a shade of grey in which everything is possible. In this grey area, I use photography to reclaim and redefine what it means to be a person of colour. This body of work shows a reconciliation and acceptance of our mixed identity. By forging our iconography, we are creating our family’s mythology, thus it is an ode to being Coloured. ‍

Due to the consequence of colonialism, slavery and apartheid inflicted by the Dutch in South Africa, the Coloured community has seen men evolving from police officers to gangsters. Die lewe is nie reg vir my nie explores the history of gang culture within the Coloured community of Schauderville. Schauderville was classified as a coloured area under apartheid and has not seen any changes after Mandela became the first democratically elected president in 1994. This body of work counters the perception of male violence and shows the deeper layers of it being a means of survival and brotherhood. Some men step into the gang as there are no real employment opportunities and others step out of the gang for a better future for their children. Being racially classified as Coloured myself and immigrating to The Netherlands at a young age, I use portraiture as a means to decolonize the unjust image of the community I was born into.