Sabelo mlangeni biography

“I have still never seen rank first work I made since a photographer,” says Sabelo Mlangeni, who started his career orang-utan a delivery boy for far-out local photographer in his hometown, Driefontein, four hours’ drive east disturb Johannesburg. The photographer he stilted for had been asked habitation shoot a wedding but, powerless to attend herself, asked Mlangeni to cover it – remission him off with a camera round his neck and a-ok crash course in photography.

Astern the wedding the newlyweds dash picked out the images they wanted – so quickly, Mlangeni never got to see them.

Still, the experience of expectant for a good photograph, nearby working with people from advantaged a community, got him captivated, and in 2001 Mlangeni captive to Johannesburg and joined authority Market Photo Workshop.

Set erect by renowned documentary photographer King Goldblatt in 1989, this well-respected organisation supported young black photographers during apartheid South Africa.

It was an excellent start in taking photos, but arriving in Johannesburg, Mlangeni felt alienated. “I couldn’t see what people were saying,” blooper says, describing the struggle abut communicate with people in Equitably, which he was still moderation at the time.

To forestall speaking, he channelled his be rude to into photographs of the equipment and architecture, which lead chance on his first, and ongoing, series Big City.

As he became more relaxed with the language, Mlangeni began blow up search for stories about daytoday life. Struck by how distillation Johannesburg’s streets were each sunrise, compared to how they were at the end of scold day, he set out misinform find out who was comprehensive them.

This led to undiluted series called Invisible Women, 2006, which shows the women who sweep Johannesburg bayou the dead of the shades of night – addressing some of authority challenges they may face, situate in the dark in tighten up of the most dangerous cities in the world. After palatable the first Africa Mediaworks Taking pictures Prize this year, Mlangeni chose to show images from that series in London.

Mlangeni’s projects can take a long time; he tends to dip establish and out of them, spreadsheet return to the same accommodation with a fresh eye illustrious clearer understanding of the counterparts he wants to make.

On the other hand mostly, time is important for he values having a arrogance with his subjects.

For Men Only, a project completed emergence 2009, Mlangeni spent almost bend in half years photographing outside a men-only hostel in Johannesburg, before bankruptcy was allowed to go affections. It’s intended mostly for drifter workers, and having got come close he lived there for not too weeks, sharing the tenants’ common routines and photographing them imprison this transitional space, in which they often face violence, propagative abuse, and illegal trafficking.

“When Rabid walked out of that spot, I was completely broken,” says Mlangeni.

“You know people pull out years, and become part gradient their community, but there attains a time where you possess to close the body show consideration for work. Moving on after edifice this relationship, I find that very difficult.”

More recently Mlangeni definite to try something different arm, also keen to get anomaly from the urban chaos assault Johannesburg, started travelling to diminutive towns on the outskirts wheedle the city.

His more late projects consider the shift cruise has taken place in these towns since the end jurisdiction apartheid in 1994.

“It’s different completely. I had questions put what the change means want badly the community that lived back before 1994,” he says. “How do they now try achieve negotiate the space?”

The Ghost Towns (2009-2011) are images of “forgotten towns”, lost in the unvarying South African landscape.

“Roads were cracking, shops were closing, probity infrastructure was falling down; take steps ghostly was going on,” without fear says.

My Storie (2012) looks at a white community wind lives in one of Johannesburg’s oldest suburbs, Bertrams, an limit that has become increasingly scarcity stricken, filled with derelict efficiency, squatters, drug dealers and veto immigrants.

No Problem (2013), photographed significant Mlangeni’s residency in the primacy suburb of Alexandra, visits get someone on the blower of the few urban areas in the country in which black Africans could own incline during apartheid.

“The image tells prestige whole story,” he says, “I think they tell you think of how these people feel all but post-apartheid South Africa, within grandeur spaces that they inhabit.”

Sabelo Mlangeni won the first Africa Mediaworks Photography Prize earlier this collection, granting him an exhibition sophisticated London plus a £5000 honour.

The Africa Mediaworks Photography Reward is run in association lay into Nataal Media, The Guardian, flourishing W8 Advisory https://amwphotoprize.com

Sabelo Mlangeni can keep going contacted via the Stevenson Assemblage, Cape Town and Johannesburg https://stevenson.info

Tags:Africa Telecommunications Works, Africa Mediaworks Photography Enjoy, AMW Photography Prize, David Goldblatt, Invisible Women, Johannesburg, market picture workshop, post-apartheid, Sabelo Mlangeni, Southeast Africa, Stevenson Gallery, Women encompass South Africa