Red Pepper television studios, Johannesburg. A background actor waiting for his entrance on stage. Johannesburg.
Student going to school. Johannesburg.
Township panoramic view, Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Train surfing is a widespread phenomenon in Johannesburg and the surrounding townships. Every year hundreds of young man lost their life trying to surf over the top or on the back of Metro-Line trains. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Casting outside television studios in city center, Johannesburg.
Red Pepper television studios, Johannesburg. Making of a national rap talent show.
2014 presidential election. Peoples singing at the Democratic Alliance final rally, Coca Cola Dome, Johannesburg.
2014 presidential election. Youth marching band at the Democratic Alliance final rally, the Coca Cola Dome, Johannesburg.
2014 presidential election. Siyanqoba rally, the last ANC electoral speech before the presidential elections. Soweto FNB stadium, Johannesburg.
Exhausted workers resting inside a buscoming back to the township. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
A man playing golf near family mausoleums. The area was propriety of five white families, expropriated in the 60's by President Verwoerd, it become a black segregated township. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Landfill, Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Crowed grocery at the payday. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
kids party after a storm. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Spazas, local slang for tuck-shops, became a feature of townships landscape under the apartheid. They are instrumental for people who still live in acute poverty and can only afford a single item. Spazas generates employment for almost 290,000 SA citizens, half of them immigrants. Xenophobic violence against immigrant Spazas owners are cyclicals since 2012.
Sabata Mbapela, at home. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Sunday mass, Jehovah's witnesses church. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
A student the day of his high-school graduation. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Kids street games. Thokoza, Johannesburg.
Chabedi Thulo training in a gym set in a garage shared by the neighborhood. Katlehong.
Chabedi Thulo chilling with friends and eating Kota. Kwesine, Johannesburg.
Sabata Maphela inside his hut smoking nyaope, a mix of heroin wastes and marijuana. Only son, his father was killed by the Zulu 4 months after his birth, in the last period of apartheid. He regularly robs persons and shops to provide money for his disabled mother and to buy the drugs he needs. Kwesine, Johannesburg.
Shaun Tebaune, outside his home, smoking nyaope, a mix of heroin wastes and marijuana. Shaun came from a middle-class family. His addiction stared when he was a minor. Kwesine, Johannesburg.
A drunk man in a kota fast food. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Illustration on a spaza's container. Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Tebogo Sadiki at home. Few days after this picture was shoot, he has been falsely imprisoned for almost two weeks charged with an imputation for rape and kidnapping of a minor. It was a false accusation led without any evidence by a CID police officer, father of the minor. The officer first intimidated Sadiki and his family and some days later jailed Chabedi Thulo and him. Thulo has been detained 2 days in the Germiston jail just because present at the moment of the arrest, Sadiki has been released by a sentence of the Palm Ridge Court of Katlehong twelve days later. He experienced violence in jail and was forced to leave Katlehong for months. The Officer has never never been charged for false arrest.
Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Tebogo Sadiki hiding in Thulo's car. Few days after this picture was shoot, he has been falsely imprisoned for almost two weeks charged with an imputation for rape and kidnapping of a minor. It was a false accusation led without any evidence by a CID police officer, father of the minor. The officer first intimidated Sadiki and his family and some days later jailed Chabedi Thulo and him. Thulo has been detained 2 days in the Germiston jail just because present at the moment of the arrest, Sadiki has been released by a sentence of the Palm Ridge Court of Katlehong twelve days later. He experienced violence in jail and was forced to leave Katlehong for months. The Officer has never never been charged for false arrest.
Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Tebogo Sadik's brother and nephew outside his home. Few days after this picture was shoot, he has been falsely imprisoned for almost two weeks charged with an imputation for rape and kidnapping of a minor. It was a false accusation led without any evidence by a CID police officer, father of the minor. The officer first intimidated Sadiki and his family and some days later jailed Chabedi Thulo and him. Thulo has been detained 2 days in the Germison jail just because present at the moment of the arrest, Sadiki has been released by a sentence of the Palm Ridge Court of Katlehong twelve days later. He experienced violence in jail and was forced to leave Katlehong for months. The Officer has never never been charged for false arrest.
Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Tebogo Sadiki leaving Katlehong with Chabedi Thulo and a friend. Few days after this picture was shoot, he has been falsely imprisoned for almost two weeks charged with an imputation for rape and kidnapping of a minor. It was a false accusation led without any evidence by a CID police officer, father of the minor. The officer first intimidated Sadiki and his family and some days later jailed Chabedi Thulo and him. Thulo has been detained 2 days in the Germoston jail just because present at the moment of the arrest, Sadiki has been released by a sentence of the Palm Ridge Court of Katlehong twelve days later. He experienced violence in jail and was forced to leave Katlehong for months. The Officer has never never been charged for false arrest.
Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Katlehong, Johannesburg.
Tebogo Sadiki hiding in Ventersburg, Free State with Chabedi Thulo and a friend. Few days after this picture was shoot, he has been falsely imprisoned for almost two weeks charged with an imputation for rape and kidnapping of a minor. It was a false accusation led without any evidence by a CID police officer, father of the minor. The officer first intimidated Sadiki and his family and some days later jailed Chabedi Thulo and him. Thulo has been detained 2 days in the Germiston jail just because present at the moment of the arrest, Sadiki has been released by a sentence of the Palm Ridge Court of Katlehong twelve days later. He experienced violence in jail and was forced to leave Katlehong for months. The Officer has never never been charged for false arrest. Ventersburg, Free State.
The girl crying on the right of the frame is the minor. She was there to recognise Chabedi Thulo while police officers were arresting him outside his house. He has been falsely imprisoned with Tebogo Sadiki for almost two weeks charged with an imputation for rape and kidnapping of the minor. It was a false accusation led without any evidence by a CID police officer, father of the minor. The officer first intimidated Sadiki and his family and some days later jailed Chabedi Thulo and him. Thulo has been detained 2 days in the Germiston jail just because present at the moment of the arrest, Sadiki has been released by a sentence of the Palm Ridge Court of Katlehong twelve days later. He experienced violence in jail and was forced to leave Katlehong for months. The Officer has never never been charged for false arrest. Ventersburg, Free State.
Saskia Thulo, Chabedi's grandmother, the day he's been released from the Germison jail. He lives with the grandma since his childhood. Kwesine, Johannesburg.
Chabedi Thulo at home, having a bath with aloe vera the day he's been released from the Germiston jail. In Sotho traditions the aloe vera is useful to drive away evil spirits. Kwesine, Johannesburg.
Born Free
South Africa
This are crucial years for democracy in South Africa. 2014 presidential elections have been the first since the death of Nelson Mandela. Even though the ANC party has been reconfirmed, the country social and structural issues turn out to be even more evident for those who have never lived the hardnesses of apartheid. These youth, born after 1994 and also known as the born-free generation, have been called to the polls for the first time in their life, aware that the social justice their father had promised did not come true. After being segregation areas during the apartheid, townships have then faced the improvement of basic services such as drainage systems or access to electricity and the constant growth of the black middle class. Katlehong, located 35km south-east of Johannesburg, is the geographic focus of this work and is the second biggest township of the country with its five-hundred-thousand inhabitants. Even though the name means “place of success” in Zulu language, it remains one of the most poor and problematic areas of the country. Violence and even murders are the daily nature for who lives here. Alcoholism and drug addiction are a social scourge. Dangerousness and constant social tension are remarked by protected walls, barbed wire and electrified fences which characterize every house and building in the area. The rivalry between ethnic groups helped the apartheid regime for decades, but are now only faded memories for the born-frees. These youth feel part of the western culture and aesthetics, especially to gansgta-rap lifestyle. However, many traditions coming from the townships are still alive, like the “penny penny day”.
YEAR: 2013-2015 LOCATION: Johannesburg, Soth Africa AWARDS: – 2014 World Press Photo Multimedia Contest, 1° prize in the Short Feature category – 2014-5 30under30by Magnum Photos – 2014 Lucie Foundation Emerging Scholarship – 2014-5 PDN Photo Annual Award in video category EXHIBITIONS: – 2014World Press Photo exhibition, Pulitzer Hall, Brown Institute for Media Innovation. NYC, USA. – 157th International Print Exhibition, Royal Albert Hall, London, UK. – 2014 Cortona On The Move Festival, off circuit. Cortona, IT. – 2014 Leica Galerie. Milan IT MAIN PUBBLICATIONS: – National Geographic Proof (USA) – Wired Photos (USA) – CNN Photos (USA) – Tages Anzeiger (CH) – LFI Leica Fotografie International (DE)
PENNY PENNY DAY