Description
Book SynopsisZanele Muholi: Somnyama Ngonyama, Hail the Dark Lioness includes one hundred self-portraits created by one of the most powerful visual activists of our time. In each of the images, Muholi drafts material props from her immediate environment in an effort to reflect her journey, explore her own image and possibilities as a black woman in today’s global society, and — most important — to speak emphatically in response to contemporary and historical rascisms. As she states, “I am producing this photographic document to encourage people to be brave enough to occupy spaces, brave enough to create without fear of being vilified. . . . To teach people about our history, to re-think what history is all about, to re-claim it for ourselves, to encourage people to use artistic tools such as cameras as weapons to fight back.”
More than twenty curators, poets, and authors offer written contributions that draw out the layers of meaning and possible readings to accompany select images. Powerfully arresting, this collection is as much a manifesto of resistance as it is an autobiographical, artistic statement.
Trade Review“The first thing to note about
Zanele Muholi: Somnyama Ngonyama: Hail the Dark Lioness is that it begins before you open it. The striking cover portrait itself—“Ntozakhe II, Parktown, Johannesburg,” from 2016—demands ample time to be taken in…This is how the book starts on you, its front and back cover working together to prepare you for what lies within. A hint at its insides.”—Yrsa Daley-Ward,
The New York Times Book Review
