LEISURE
(circa the 1960 - 1980’s) - May 2022
Leisure is the title of my undergraduate thesis.
Presented in a mock-lounge set up to resemble that of my grandparents, I am inviting the viewer to uncover these images and histories with me.
Together we discover the lives lived in communirty and joy; an act of stark defiance of an oppressive regime.
In June 2021, I found a collection of slide film photographs in my paternal grandparents' basement. Until my uncle mentioned them in passing, I wasn’t aware of their existance. We dug them out of the back of the garage, set up a carousel projector at the dining room table, and clicked through each slide while my grandfather and uncle shared their stories. As I listened, I realised these images were more than family snapshots—they were a visual history, a record of moments that might have been lost, othwerise overlooked by the historical record.
My grandfather, a photographer at the (then) University of Natal in Durban, spent forty-six years documenting surgeries for the university at King Edward VIII Hospital —bone grafts, kidney transplants, coronary bypasses. His job was to create teaching slides for the medical professors. These family images are the result of his access to photography and awarenss of the opportunity that this presented. He didn’t have to photograph birthdays, beach trips, or afternoons in the garden—but he chose to. That choice speaks to an understanding of their importance.
Ultimately, the reason these images are so important is because they portray joy: birthday parties, trips to the beach, visiting family when a child is born. These are moments in which my family, despite being displaced people of Indian heritage in South Africa and living under Apartheid rule, shared in joy and community. Oftentimes, these narratives become overshadowed by the horrors of the oppressive regime that was the Apartheid government. So to find these images—where they are not just celebrated, but recorded for posterity—is proof that my family, like so many other South Africans, lived their lives as best they could (as much as they were permitted). And to live in community in this manner, whilst actively being oppressed, is a form of resistance. This is what interests me about these images: they portray quotidian defiance.
Vernacular materials like these photographs take on new significance when intentionally engaged with and preserved. They exist outside official histories—histories written by those in power, by colonizers and tyrants who declared their version of events as objective truth. But these images challenge that supposed objectivity. They present an alternative archive, one that speaks to lived experience rather than imposed narratives. In reading them within this context, we begin to see how personal and familial documentation can supplement and counterbalance dominant histories, ensuring that what was overlooked, erased, or deemed unimportant is given the space to exist and be remembered.
This book is a refusal to let that history fade. It’s about remembering and telling the full story. More than that, it’s a celebration of my family’s ability to find joy, to document it, and to ensure that these moments were not forgotten.
(circa the 1960 - 1980’s) - May 2022
Presented in a mock-lounge set up to resemble that of my grandparents, I am inviting the viewer to uncover these images and histories with me.
Together we discover the lives lived in communirty and joy; an act of stark defiance of an oppressive regime.
In June 2021, I found a collection of slide film photographs in my paternal grandparents' basement. Until my uncle mentioned them in passing, I wasn’t aware of their existance. We dug them out of the back of the garage, set up a carousel projector at the dining room table, and clicked through each slide while my grandfather and uncle shared their stories. As I listened, I realised these images were more than family snapshots—they were a visual history, a record of moments that might have been lost, othwerise overlooked by the historical record.
My grandfather, a photographer at the (then) University of Natal in Durban, spent forty-six years documenting surgeries for the university at King Edward VIII Hospital —bone grafts, kidney transplants, coronary bypasses. His job was to create teaching slides for the medical professors. These family images are the result of his access to photography and awarenss of the opportunity that this presented. He didn’t have to photograph birthdays, beach trips, or afternoons in the garden—but he chose to. That choice speaks to an understanding of their importance.
Ultimately, the reason these images are so important is because they portray joy: birthday parties, trips to the beach, visiting family when a child is born. These are moments in which my family, despite being displaced people of Indian heritage in South Africa and living under Apartheid rule, shared in joy and community. Oftentimes, these narratives become overshadowed by the horrors of the oppressive regime that was the Apartheid government. So to find these images—where they are not just celebrated, but recorded for posterity—is proof that my family, like so many other South Africans, lived their lives as best they could (as much as they were permitted). And to live in community in this manner, whilst actively being oppressed, is a form of resistance. This is what interests me about these images: they portray quotidian defiance.
Vernacular materials like these photographs take on new significance when intentionally engaged with and preserved. They exist outside official histories—histories written by those in power, by colonizers and tyrants who declared their version of events as objective truth. But these images challenge that supposed objectivity. They present an alternative archive, one that speaks to lived experience rather than imposed narratives. In reading them within this context, we begin to see how personal and familial documentation can supplement and counterbalance dominant histories, ensuring that what was overlooked, erased, or deemed unimportant is given the space to exist and be remembered.
This book is a refusal to let that history fade. It’s about remembering and telling the full story. More than that, it’s a celebration of my family’s ability to find joy, to document it, and to ensure that these moments were not forgotten.