Patience

1000 x 800mm

I spent a couple of months back in 2005, traipsing through South Africa and Swaziland, spending most of my time in the wild Transkei.  I felt that this was the  real South Africa I'd come to see. The Xhosa homelands, full of rich traditional life and music.  In the morning's girls sing as they bake dark bread on the fire, warthogs nestle in close with their piglets to stay warm.  Round turquoise mud huts with thatched roofs dot the landscape - no running water or electricity.  At the market, women sit behind their stands sharing the latest gossip with a series of clicks, threading more bright beads into their latest creation or just fanning away the flies. In the middle of nowhere a group of naked boys gather with white washed skin and blankets draped over them like a capes. They are going through abaKwetha - a initiation into manhood. In the afternoons, children down at the beach play football in their undies as a herd of cows wander through their game.    Abandoned bottle shops crumble here and there but personal wealth is still measured by the number of cows you own.  
This artwork is of a woman called Patience who I met near Coffee Bay.