Here and There

Hereford Photography Festival is now the longest running annual celebration of photography in the UK.  For the first time in its 18 year history, the festival has moved from its traditional month of October, to May and June. It is hoped that more visitors will be able to see the wide-ranging exhibitions, projects and events that focus on the theme of rural change and disruption in a globalising world.

Continuing the theme of last year’s festival, South African contemporary photography work in the post-apartheid era, the much-acclaimed photographer Roger Ballen, who’s challenging and surreal work Shadow Chamber will be seen for the first time in the UK.  Jodi Bieber’s portrayal of growing up with South Africa, Between Dogs and Wolves, attempts to combat the inaccurate reporting of the traditionally depicted ‘youth team’.  With the Namibian landscapes of Out There, Guy Raivitz revisits Southern Africa to document lifestyles in rural communities and to raise mine awareness for UNICEF.  Winner of Harvard’s Robert Gardener Fellowship in Photography, Johannesburg-based Guy Tillim’s work Petros Village depicts the inhabitants’ precarious existence under a ruthless climate in central Malawi.  In Paramount Place, Ilan Godfrey presents a contrasting and gentle portrait of Johannesburg’s Hillbrow which, over the past decade, has been largely perceived as being in terminal decline.  These exhibitions have been edited by Bridget Coaker of Troika Photos Ltd.

Other photographers exhibiting include Birmingham’s Andrew Jackson with Beyond the rainbow, which examines the ‘Born Free Generation’; free from the ideologies of the past and able to construct their identities at will.  A prolific photographer for Stern and Newsweek magazines and many others, Per-Anders Pettersson’s work Black Empowerment depicts how a new, emerging South Africa, still troubled by its racially divided past, begins to provide opportunities for its people despite their race and ethnic background.