Starting with my 1st Assignment on “my neighbourhood” I decided to do it as a timeline, as the area where I stay are relatively old and Pretoria was founded in 1855. My house was built in 1945 and the community around me consist of fairly big houses and family orientated groups. I decided to do my assignment in the form of a Story telling project and in the form of Polaroid’s. I was fortunate to do an aerial a few years ago and decided to use this as the opening to establish Pretoria and I could not go on another aerial and decided to use this photo. If you look at the photo and to the left approximately 10 km from there is the area I currently reside, Villieria. In my thought process or storytelling I wanted to work from the outside in. Starting with the city, moving to the suburb and then on what the suburb is all about to me!
The suburb of Villieria also known as “The Moot”, area between two ridges, I photographed with a 10mm fish eye. I did this photo shoot on a Sunday as the road on the left is heavy congested on weekdays and just to the left over the ridge is the Presidents Official Home.
I am moving now towards my house to establish my dwelling and I did a time exposure shot of 30seconds with a fish eye. Post processing on all the abov eimages was not really neccasserry as I either used a polariser or time exposure. I do the normal workflow processes such as crop, contrast and levels.
What makes this area so interesting is the family orientated suburb. In Pretoria we have outgrown the inner city circle and every where there is townhouses, golf estates etc to cater for the thousands of job seekers. We are also prone to lots of crime, high jacking, armed robbery, house breakings and vagrants invading the neighbourhood. So to go out and take photos of a bunch of strangers is not easy as some are illegal immigrants and they do not want to be identified. Also the rule of privacy and not photographing children etc are also strictly adhere to.
The Moot is very family orientated as the sites on which the houses are built, are quite large and this allows for family gatherings, lots of kids and most people have a swimming pools and lots of nice gardens. We either have kids or dogs or both. In my street alone there is not one house without a dog.
This is also because of crime and most houses have electric fences or private security companies to assist in crime fighting. The police are not the most reliable and we make use of community watch companies to help fight crime, but still we carry on like normal people and enjoy good family gatherings. Thus this is the following series of photographs. I am including a photo of my father as he passed away a few years ago, we did not live close by and when we got together it was always shared with good food and wine.
The next photo symbolises the special bond between humans and dogs. This dog came wandering into their dwelling on a stormy night and the two dogs they already have are not young, about 13 years. This was like a calling, as my friend’s sister opened the door the next morning for the dog to come into the house there were three, instead of two, 3 months later one of the older male dogs died. I decided to convert to black and white with a bit of a high pass filter to accentuate the dog and the background.
The neighbourhood is also well know for the elderly that still owns property or live with their children. For me the concept went directly to a more conceptual way of showing the elderly. I took photos of some of my friends mother’s, but decided to show a more unconventional way of old age . Post processing involved normal conversion to black and white and tight cropping and shooting of the concept.
When we move away from direct families we come to the neighbours. South Africa has fairly big groups or bikers that ride for recreation on weekends. Pretoria is no exception and my neighbour and his wife both belong to the Harley group. They have done a breakfast ride with me on occasions. He is quite a character and loves the tattoos. This photo was done with a single flash from the left and some sun streaking in from the top left. I converted to black and white and pushed up the contrast to create an industrial kind of look.
Pretoria and the whole of South Africa have a very high unemployment rate and a lot of unschooled people want a “peace” job. This means any jobs such as gardening or domestic workers. There is also a lot of begging on street corners and coming to your house to ask for money etc. I photographed my domestic’s hands to show the gesture that is usually associated with this.My domestic can read and write and went to school. She is putting her kids through school and I use her husband in my garden when he is available and wants some extra money.I have come along road with my domestic and the neighbourhood tends to keep the domestics and gardeners around for as long as possible.
We do have people on certain street corners on weekends that will work for a day lone. Te problem is that you do not know from where they are, if they are legal or just out to do a criminal act. Most of the people my neighbours and I employ are loyal and we are bound by contracts and the law to pay certain benefits. This helps to avoid exploitation and give them a living wage.I have a second photo that is more a conceptual way of showing job creation and remuneration. The whole concept was in white and thus the final project was a black and white image.
Due to unemployment under the youth we also have quite a drug and alcohol abuse under today’s youth. We have rehabilitation programs that run through the church and certain welfare organisations to try and counter this. We also have a tendency that kids these days do not want to work or do hard labour jobs. Some leave school early due to abuse or neglect. I shot this at night to emphasise the loneliness and desperation. This was done with the time exposure.
Then finally as we have a lot of people moving in and out of the Moot during the day we have a train station that goes to the city or to some other suburbs. This system is not a very safe or reliable system as cable theft plays a big role in trains not being on time. The new Gautrain system that was implemented last year with the World Cup Soccer is very expensive and only runs in certain areas and to certain suburbs. I shot the train station over the weekend and there were not a lot of people around. I used some filters and vignette effects to show a bit of decay and that it is not reliable. This is my story on my neighbourhood and what makes it work and how people in and around the community work together to create jobs and a better and safer environment.
