New York David Goldblatt Strange Instrument Curated by Zanele MuholiIn Collaboration with Yancey Richardson GalleryFeb 26 – Mar 27, 2021 David Goldblatt was renowned for creating powerful images that revealed the complex and far-reaching dynamics of apartheid, as well as the post-apartheid conditions that continue to impact his native country to this day.Curated by South African artist and activist Zanele Muholi in collaboration with Yancey Richardson Gallery, David Goldblatt: Strange Instrument presents 45 vintage prints by the late South African photographer. The exhibition groups the works into idiosyncratic categories that reflect Muholi’s deeply personal engagement with the work of Goldblatt, who was a teacher, a mentor, and a friend. Muholi’s own work explores similarly complex issues of gender, labor, and race that continue to permeate contemporary South African society. Exhibition DetailsDavid Goldblatt: Strange InstrumentFeb 26 – Mar 27, 2021 (opens in a new window) Schedule Your Visit Gallery540 West 25th StreetNew YorkAbove: Installation view, David Goldblatt: Strange Instrument, February 26 – March 27, 2021, Pace Gallery, New York © The David Goldblatt Legacy Trust PressPress Release Connect (opens in a new window) @pacegallery Pace Gallery is pleased to present David Goldblatt: Strange Instrument, an exhibition that brings together 45 photographs documenting South Africa—where Goldblatt was born in 1930 and lived until his death in 2018—at the height of apartheid, between the early 1960s and the end of the 1980s. Curated by artist and activist Zanele Muholi, who was Goldblatt’s friend and mentee, the exhibition offers a deeply personal meditation on the brutality and humanity that Goldblatt captured in his strikingly beautiful images of everyday lives under conditions of profound injustice. Strange Instrument—on view February 26 – March 27, 2021—marks the first time that Muholi has engaged with Goldblatt’s work since his passing in 2018. Taking an expansive and affective approach to their mentor’s body of work, the exhibition presents a portrait of Goldblatt himself through Muholi’s eyes. Read More On Women, Being Seen David Goldblatt, Members of the Methodist Church on the East Rand meet to find ways of reducing the racial, cultural and class barriers which divide them, 3 July 1980, gelatin silver hand print, 14-3/4" × 14-3/4" (37.5 cm × 37.5 cm), image 16" × 15-7/8" (40.6 cm × 40.3 cm), paper Learn More Close modal View Previous View Next Carousel slide 0 Carousel slide 1 David Goldblatt Members of the Methodist Church on the East Rand meet to find ways of reducing the racial, cultural and class barriers which divide them 3 July 1980 gelatin silver hand print 14-3/4" × 14-3/4" (37.5 cm × 37.5 cm), image 16" × 15-7/8" (40.6 cm × 40.3 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back David Goldblatt, Saturday morning at the Hypermarket: semi-final of the Miss Lovely Legs Competition, 1980, gelatin silver hand print, 11" × 11" (27.9 cm × 27.9 cm), image 12-1/2" × 12" (31.8 cm × 30.5 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt Saturday morning at the Hypermarket: semi-final of the Miss Lovely Legs Competition 1980 gelatin silver hand print 11" × 11" (27.9 cm × 27.9 cm), image 12-1/2" × 12" (31.8 cm × 30.5 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back Surveying the diverse range of Goldblatt’s output, the show encompasses portraits and street scenes shot on the corners and parks of Johannesburg and other cities, as well as in neighborhoods and segregated townships where black and “colored” communities lived. Many such locales were later subjected to systematic demolition and dispossession of land, making Goldblatt’s photographs some of their only existing documentation. Such scenes are interwoven with images of commerce, architecture, mining, religion, leisure, and domestic life. The earliest image in the exhibition dates to 1962—just over a decade after the segregationist National Party rose to power in South Africa—and the latest work dates to 1990, the year that anti-apartheid revolutionary Nelson Mandela was freed from prison. Goldblatt did not consider himself an activist and never set out to make political work or anti-apartheid “propaganda”; however, he was always clear about his mission to expose the social and interpersonal reality of South Africa’s policies. “I will not allow my work to be compromised,” he once declared in (opens in a new window) an interview with Art21 which was filmed and edited in the months prior to his passing in June 2018. “I comprise every day just by drawing breath in this country.” Read More On Movements, City Life David Goldblatt, On the corner of Commissioner and Eloff Streets, 1979, gelatin silver hand print, 10-1/2" × 10-1/2" (26.7 cm × 26.7 cm), image 15-7/8" × 12" (40.3 cm × 30.5 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt On the corner of Commissioner and Eloff Streets 1979 gelatin silver hand print 10-1/2" × 10-1/2" (26.7 cm × 26.7 cm), image 15-7/8" × 12" (40.3 cm × 30.5 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back David Goldblatt, Saturday morning at the corner of Commissioner and Trichardts Streets, 1979-1980, gelatin silver hand print, 14-3/4" × 14-3/4" (37.5 cm × 37.5 cm), image 15-7/8" × 15-7/8" (40.3 cm × 40.3 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt Saturday morning at the corner of Commissioner and Trichardts Streets 1979-1980 gelatin silver hand print 14-3/4" × 14-3/4" (37.5 cm × 37.5 cm), image 15-7/8" × 15-7/8" (40.3 cm × 40.3 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back The camera is a strange instrument. It demands, first of all, that you see coherently. It makes it possible for you to enter into worlds, and places, and associations that would otherwise be very difficult to do. David Goldblatt On Textured David Goldblatt, Domestic worker on Abel Road, Hillbrow, 1973, gelatin silver hand print, 9" × 9" (22.9 cm × 22.9 cm), image 13-7/8" × 10-7/8" (35.2 cm × 27.6 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt Domestic worker on Abel Road, Hillbrow 1973 gelatin silver hand print 9" × 9" (22.9 cm × 22.9 cm), image 13-7/8" × 10-7/8" (35.2 cm × 27.6 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back David Goldblatt, Woman with pierced ear. Joubert Park, Johannesburg., 1975, gelatin silver hand print, 8-5/8" × 8-7/8" (21.9 cm × 22.5 cm), image 15-7/8" × 12" (40.3 cm × 30.5 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt Woman with pierced ear. Joubert Park, Johannesburg. 1975 gelatin silver hand print 8-5/8" × 8-7/8" (21.9 cm × 22.5 cm), image 15-7/8" × 12" (40.3 cm × 30.5 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back Muholi first became aware of Goldblatt in the early 2000s through their involvement in the Market Photo Workshop—a creative community, gallery, and school in Johannesburg dedicated to contemporary photography, which Goldblatt helped to found. Influenced by Goldblatt’s Particulars series—which features extreme close-up crops of bodies— Muholi struck up a friendship with the renowned photographer, though they were separated in age by more than five decades. “David became more than just a [mentor], he became a friend and a father figure,” Muholi recalls, “He was a chosen person in my life who made a huge difference.” Although Goldblatt’s body of work spans more than seven decades, the exhibition concentrates on the South Africa of the 1970s and ‘80s—the world in which Muholi themself came of age. Read More Fashion Sense, Self Confidence David Goldblatt, George and Sarah Manyane, 3153 Emdeni Extension, August 1972, gelatin silver hand print, 10-1/4" × 10-1/4" (26 cm × 26 cm), image 11-7/8" × 11-7/8" (30.2 cm × 30.2 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt George and Sarah Manyane, 3153 Emdeni Extension August 1972 gelatin silver hand print 10-1/4" × 10-1/4" (26 cm × 26 cm), image 11-7/8" × 11-7/8" (30.2 cm × 30.2 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back Equal parts artist and documentarian, Goldblatt was known for his practice of attaching extensive captions to his photographs, which almost always identify the subject, place, and time in which the image was taken. These titles often play a vital role in exposing the visible and invisible forces through which the country’s policies of extreme racism and segregation shaped the dynamics of life, especially along axes of gender, labor, identity, and freedom of movement. Beyond endowing his images with documentary power, Goldblatt’s titles also dignify the people and places he photographs. To balance the authoritative weight of Goldblatt’s captions, Muholi has grouped the works in the show into 22 idiosyncratic categories of their own devising—including “ On Nurturing,” “On Sleep,” “On Friendships,” “On Textured,” “On Poverty,” and “On Pulse”—which reflect their own individual response to the image alongside the historical information contained in the caption. Read More On Poverty David Goldblatt, Woman resting at the trading store. Hobeni, Bomvanaland, Transkei, 1975, gelatin silver hand print, 14-3/8" × 14-3/8" (36.5 cm × 36.5 cm), image 16" × 15-7/8" (40.6 cm × 40.3 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt Woman resting at the trading store. Hobeni, Bomvanaland, Transkei 1975 gelatin silver hand print 14-3/8" × 14-3/8" (36.5 cm × 36.5 cm), image 16" × 15-7/8" (40.6 cm × 40.3 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back Goldblatt’s images rarely picture outright violence or exploitation, but more often capture the subtleties and nuances of apartheid’s insidious effect on the mundane existence of communities of color. The formal beauty of the images is often a mechanism for rendering palpable the sinister ways in which apartheid infiltrated even the most private and mundane aspects of social existence. “A common response from potential publishers was: Where are the apartheid signs?” Goldblatt once recalled to Art21 of his efforts to publish his work abroad: “To me, [apartheid] was embedded deep, deep, deep in the grain of those photographs. People overseas simply didn’t grasp these extraordinary contradictions in our life.” While Goldblatt’s ability to gain access to and make photographs in such a wide range of contexts is partly what allowed him to produce such an extraordinary and influential body of work, it also reflected his privileged status as a white person under conditions of strict racial segregation. No black photographer could have moved so easily through such a diversity of social spaces. As a Jewish person, Goldblatt meanwhile existed apart from the dominant white community of Afrikaaners, and often described feeling internally like an outsider—a self-alienation that sharpened his critical gaze. Read More On Freedom to be Gendered David Goldblatt, Woman on a bench. Joubert Park, Johannesburg., 1975, gelatin silver hand print, 14-1/2" × 14-5/8" (36.8 cm × 37.1 cm), image 17-3/8" × 15-7/8" (44.1 cm × 40.3 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt Woman on a bench. Joubert Park, Johannesburg. 1975 gelatin silver hand print 14-1/2" × 14-5/8" (36.8 cm × 37.1 cm), image 17-3/8" × 15-7/8" (44.1 cm × 40.3 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back David Goldblatt, Couple at The Wilds. Johannesburg., 1975, gelatin silver hand print, 14-1/4" × 14-1/2" (36.2 cm × 36.8 cm), image 15-1/2" × 15-3/4" (39.4 cm × 40 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt Couple at The Wilds. Johannesburg. 1975 gelatin silver hand print 14-1/4" × 14-1/2" (36.2 cm × 36.8 cm), image 15-1/2" × 15-3/4" (39.4 cm × 40 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back For Muholi, Goldblatt’s work points us to the fact that ultimately, “photography is about accessibility.” How do images grant access to the lives of others, to vital yet problematic histories that time threatens to erode, and to stories and experiences that might otherwise have been rendered invisible? Access is also a marker of privilege, an index of who possesses the power to make such documents, to wield the camera, to capture a photograph: “How were these images taken really?” Muholi asks of Goldblatt’s portraits of anonymous people in the markets and parks of Johannesburg and Transkei. “How do they speak to the South African archives? […] I, as a black person, would not have had access to those spaces and the people that [Goldblatt] had the opportunity to photograph.” Muholi describes this exhibition as an effort to explore the “living memory” of Goldblatt, which continues his lifelong project of exposing conditions of injustice and oppression—those “extraordinary contradictions”—which did not disappear with the formal end of the apartheid regime. Read More On Segregation, Racial Divides, Beaches Detected Social Distance Before We Knew About It David Goldblatt, Racially Segregated beach areas and the boundary between them. Strand, Western Cape., 16 April 1983, gelatin silver hand print, 10" × 8" (25.4 cm × 20.3 cm), image 13-1/8" × 12" (33.3 cm × 30.5 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt Racially Segregated beach areas and the boundary between them. Strand, Western Cape. 16 April 1983 gelatin silver hand print 10" × 8" (25.4 cm × 20.3 cm), image 13-1/8" × 12" (33.3 cm × 30.5 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back On Recreation, Privilege David Goldblatt, Dancing-master, Ted van Rensburg, watches two of his ballroom pupils swinging to a recording of Victor Sylvester and his Orchestra, in the MOTHS’ Hall at the old Court House, 1980, gelatin silver hand print, 8-1/4" × 12-1/8" (21 cm × 30.8 cm), image 11" × 13-7/8" (27.9 cm × 35.2 cm), paper Learn More Close modal David Goldblatt Dancing-master, Ted van Rensburg, watches two of his ballroom pupils swinging to a recording of Victor Sylvester and his Orchestra, in the MOTHS’ Hall at the old Court House 1980 gelatin silver hand print 8-1/4" × 12-1/8" (21 cm × 30.8 cm), image 11" × 13-7/8" (27.9 cm × 35.2 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back David Goldblatt, Girl in her new tutu on the stoep of her parents’ house, 22 June 1980, gelatin silver hand print, 18-1/8" × 14-1/8" (46 cm × 35.9 cm), image 19-1/2" × 15-5/8" (49.5 cm × 39.7 cm), paper Learn More Close modal View Previous View Next Carousel slide 0 Carousel slide 1 Carousel slide 2 Carousel slide 3 Carousel slide 4 Carousel slide 5 David Goldblatt Girl in her new tutu on the stoep of her parents’ house 22 June 1980 gelatin silver hand print 18-1/8" × 14-1/8" (46 cm × 35.9 cm), image 19-1/2" × 15-5/8" (49.5 cm × 39.7 cm), paper Inquire How can we reach you? First Name* Last Name* Email* Phone Inquiry Message Have you purchased from Pace before?* Yes No Submit Inquiry Or go back To inquire about all of the works in this exhibition and more works by David Goldblatt, email inquiries@pacegallery.com. Read More David GoldblattDavid Goldblatt chronicled the structures, people and landscapes of South Africa from 1948 until his death in June 2018. Well known for his photography which explored both public and private life in South Africa, Goldblatt created a body of powerful images which depicted life during the time of Apartheid. Goldblatt also extensively photographed colonial era monuments and buildings with the idea that the architecture reveals something about the people who built them.Learn More