Pieter Hugo's exhibition 'Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea'
With his authentic yet surreal portraits, South African photographer Pieter Hugo reaches out to the marginalized. His exhibition, "Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea" is now on at the Wolfsburg Kunstmuseum.
Pieter Hugo: the photographer as an outsider
Pieter Hugo likes to photograph outsiders: scrap collectors, beggars, drug addicts. The white South African artist sees himself as an outsider, too. This is a self-portrait he took with his son. His photos, now on display at the Kunstmuseum in Wolfsburg, also question how children should be raised in post-apartheid South Africa.
Breaking with clichés
A man sleeps under a tree in Green Point Common Park, in Cape Town, on a foggy day. Typical photos of this park are filled with sunshine and visitors. This picture rather expresses loneliness and homelessness. The tree can also be seen as a symbol of South Africa: it is slowly growing, but it still has many problems and carries the heavy weight of history on its shoulders.
What connects - and divides - people
What does it mean to be a family? What are the fragile relationships that make up a society? What brings people together? What divides them? These are some of the questions Pieter Hugo asks throughout his series "Kin."
At home in Soweto
This still life in the "Kin" photo series was taken in a Soweto house. It shows an ashtray, a pack of cigarettes, a plastic lid, two old remotes protected by plastic wrap, a 100-rand bill and some change on an old place mat. It all looks a little lonely and miserable.
The hyena men
For a series called "The Hyena & Other Men," Pieter Hugo traveled through Nigeria together with the "hyena men," a group of wandering showmen who entertain people with their animals to make money. These pictures show wilderness paradoxically merging with its urban surroundings. They also explore dominance and submission in the relationship between men and animals.
Taxi ride with a monkey
Traveling along with the street performers, Hugo went to Kano, in the north of Nigeria. One day, one of the showmen stopped a taxi and negotiated a price with the driver, while the rest of the group was hiding in a bush - along with their hyenas, pythons and monkeys. When their colleague gave them a sign, the colorful bunch of people and animals jumped into the cab. The driver was fuming.
Traces of colonial powers
Botswana was a British colony that became independent in 1966. The country still retains many British traditions and symbols in its legal system. That is why the judges also wear the same robes and wigs as they had done while under colonial rule. Shown here is Justice Moatlhodi Marumo, a picture from the series "Judges of Botswana."
Nollywood
Nigeria's film industry is the third largest in the world, after the US and India. Which themes appear in these films produced for a local audience? How does the country represent itself in pop culture? These questions drove Pieter Hugo to do a photo series called "Nollywood," in which he portrayed actors in Nigeria.
Focusing on the individual
For another series, Hugo photographed his friends and edited the pictures so that the details of their skin - whether freckles, blood vessels or sunburns - were contrasted in such a way that they could no longer be seen as black or white. The photographer aimed to emphasize each individual's features instead of the color of their skin.
The generation after the genocide
Apartheid ended in 1994 in South Africa. That same year, a genocide decimated Rwanda. How do children born after the events deal with the tragic history of their country without having experienced it? This is the theme Hugo explored in his series called "1994," which portrays children born after 1994.
The international perspective
Hugo produced his series "Flat Noodle Soup Talk" in Beijing. Here, too, he was interested by the contrasts between generations, between the people who grew up affected by the Chinese Communist Revolution and the country's youth, influenced by a state-controlled consumer society. Pieter Hugo's photos are on show in Wolfsburg until July 23, 2017.