a portfolio of twelve giclée prints

Artwork date: 1981 and 2008
Signature details: each signed, dated and numbered 1/20 in pencil in the margin
Exhibited: Goodman Gallery, Cape Town, 'Sue Williamson: Voices', 19 February to 26 March 2011, an example from the edition exhibited.; Norval Foundation, Cape Town, 'Mapping Worlds', 2 November 2019 to 27 January 2020.
Literature: Moloi, N. (2021) Remembering and Forgetting in Sue Williamson’s For Thirty Years Next to His Heart in MoMA. POST: Notes on Art in a Global Context (online) [Available at: https://post.moma.org/remembering-and-forgetting-in-sue-williamsons-for-thirty-years-next-to-his-heart/]

(12)

sheet size: 50 x 67 cm each; framed size: 55 x 73.5 x 3 cm each

Provenance:

Private collection, Cape Town.

Goodman Gallery, Cape Town.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK:

The Last Supper at Manley Villa documents the forced removals of District Six in Cape Town during the 1980s through the story of the Ebrahim family. The series of emotionally engaging black and white photographs were taken in the family home on the eve of their removal.

A 1966 proclamation under the Group Areas Act of 1950, declared District Six ‘for whites only’ which resulted in more than sixty thousand residents of mixed race being moved out and relocated to places like Langa and the Cape Flats. The process of forced removals by the nationalist government spanned sixteen years.

On the 2^nd of August in 1981, Naz and Harry Ebrahim celebrated Eid with their family and friends at Manley Villa for the last time. The first ten photographs record personal and still moments on that day, starting with an image dedicated to Naz, pictured outside, contemplating in deep thought as she leans on the front wall of her home. The detritus of already vacated and partly demolished houses is visible in the background. On the walls in the interior scenes are handwritten messages, recording friends and family who had been present on that day.

Included in the portfolio is a facsimile of the original eviction note – an official record that firmly cements this (one) family’s story within the main narrative of South Africa’s most tragic social history.

A few months after the last supper, the family home was demolished. The final photograph in the portfolio was taken in 2008, in colour, and records the empty location where Manley Villa once stood.

COLLECTOR'S NOTE:

A major retrospective exhibition titled; Between Memory and Forgetting of Sue Williamson’s work recently opened at The Box in Plymouth, UK. In 2022, work by Williamson was showcased in various museum exhibitions including Shifting Dialogues: Photography from The Walther Collection at Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, K21 in Düsseldorf, Germany and A Decade of Acquisitions of Works on Paper – Part II at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, USA.

Williamson features in African Artists: From 1882 to Now. Published by Phaidon in 2021, the book surveys 300 leading modern and contemporary artists born or based in Africa.

In 2020, the artist received The Living Legends Award from the South African Department of Sports, Arts and Culture.

One of the 12 prints is a framed eviction notice:
sheet size: 29 x 21 cm; framed size: 55 x 48.5 x 3 cm

COLLECTIONS:

The artist is represented in numerous local and international collections, notably, the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Tate Modern, London; Victoria & Albert Museum, London; National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C. and the Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town.