Looking at this stark and dramatic photograph, pictured right, it’s easy to imagine it as the beginning of the long walk to freedom for Nelson Mandela, as it shows a winding road leading out of Qnu, the humble, rural town where Madiba was born.“The Meaning of Home” is a photo exhibition which traces Nelson Mandela’s childhood journeys through rural towns in the Eastern Cape, and is currently on display at the Nelson Mandela Foundation’s offices.
This series of black and white photographs by acclaimed photographer, Bonile Bam, documents the landscape of Mr Mandela’s hometown and surrounds, giving us insight into the physical setting in which Mr Mandela lived as a boy.
Bam, who hails from the Eastern Cape, was selected for the prestigious Getty Images Fellows Programme, where he completed a photography course in New York before returning to South Africa. He has been exhibited in New York, Austria, the Czech Republic, Sweden and the Netherlands.
Bam said he wanted to tell the story of an icon through the landscape and structures that influenced his political life, and help people to understand Mr Mandela a bit better: “Most people don’t know where Madiba is coming from and I wanted to share with ordinary citizens, or anyone who is interested in his roots, that, as much as he is a recognised figure in the world, he is a humble person who comes from an ordinary background. I think we can motivate other people who might be hopeless and think that they cannot be leaders in the future.”
Bam’s next showing, a group exhibition of three generations of South African photographers entitled “Struggle, Apartheid and Freedom”, will open in October at the Johannesburg Art Gallery.
