George Hallett (photographer)


George Hallett was a South African photographer known for images of South African exiles and his enormous body of work captures so much of South Africa's turbulent history through Apartheid and into the young democracy.

Childhood and influences

Born in District Six, Cape Town, Hallett was raised in the fishing village of Hout Bay by his grandparents. He spent a lot of his time in his grandfather's workshop, where he was taught how to make his own toys, wagons and kites. He became interested in photography while rifling through his uncle's copies of National Geographic magazine and the black-and-white moving images of the cinema. He attended South Peninsula High School in Diep River where his English teacher, Richard Rive introduced him to the work of local and international artists and writers. Rive later became a journalist for Drum magazine but at the time he met George, he was an inspired dramatist, writer and activist. He encouraged his students not only to read from the syllabus but introduced them to writers such as James Matthews, Alex La Guma, Jan Rabie, Uys Krige, Breyten Breytenbach and others from the Sestigers movement. Another important influence was artist Peter Clarke, an Ocean View resident. Clarke focused his creativity in the field of printmaking and painting, on his community. He was involved in various community based projects and workshops.

Life and work

Hallett, without any experience in the field, chose the route of photography. He was self-taught and began his career as a street photographer. He furthered his skill by taking a correspondence course in photography with the City and Guilds in London at the age of 20. In his early work, he photographed District Six extensively, before its destruction under apartheid in the 1970s. James Matthews was instrumental in rallying Hallett to photograph District Six before it was razed. He also did freelance photography for Drum magazine, but there were not many job opportunities in South Africa. Having suffered stabbings on the Cape Flats and fed up with racism and violence in South Africa, he moved to London in 1970. He started working for The Times Educational Supplement in London and designed book covers for Heinemann Educational Books for more than 12 years. His first exhibition with South African artists Gerard Sekoto and Louis Maurice was held in Paris in 1971. This was followed by an exhibition of his South African work in the Westerkerk in Amsterdam that same year. In 1974 he moved to the South of France. He lived in a small farming community in the Pyrenees Mountains. The work from this period earned him an award from Hasselblad for outstanding contributions to photography.
Through his travels he continued to connect with exiled South Africans, many of whom were also poets, musicians, artists and writers, he soon became a part of this closely knit family. He made contact with the likes of Pallo Jordan, Alex La Guma, and Dudu Pukwana in London, and African writers such as Wole Soyinka and Ahmadou Kourouma in Berlin. Many of these images were later compiled in his book Portraits of African Writers. In 1983 he was offered an opportunity to be an Artist in Residence at the University of Illinois. He took this opportunity with both hands, spending the rest of the decade in the United States where he was invited to participate in exhibitions and projects with five other universities. He later moved to Amsterdam. He had not been there long when the ANC requested he return to South Africa to record the first Democratic Elections.
The many images that resulted earned him a Golden Eye Award from World Press Photo in Amsterdam. He was the official photographer for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 1997. Many poignant works were produced in this period. One such is the image entitled Jann Turner with Eugene de Kock, TRC Headquarters 1997. Eugene De Kock was the commander at Vlakplaas, where political activist Rick Turner, father of Jann Turner, was assassinated in front of her by security policemen. The weight of this image is in the exchange between the two subjects, with Turner's dry smile and De Kock's straight gaze ahead. This project led to his work with the Nobel Peace Centre in Oslo and the resulting travelling exhibition, Strengths and Convictions: The life and times of the South African Nobel Peace laureates Albert Luthuli, Desmond Tutu, FW de Klerk and Nelson Mandela.
Yet, Hallett's work is focused on capturing positive moments that communicate the triumph of the human spirit. He was vocal about this quality in his work. It sets his work apart from his peers and its development can be traced back to his early images of District Six and continued into his understated portraits of South African exiles. Hallett identified with the exiled, but not only politically. Images would include family and community activity as they interacted with each other, socialising, making music and the like. His partiality to the hopeful does not compromise the often sombre or dire themes he tackles through his image production. Hallett described himself as a humanist. He was strongly committed to passing on his skills to aspiring photographers, and has taught photography at American, British, European, and South African institutions. Hallett's photographs are represented in museums and galleries in South Africa as well as internationally.
Hallett died peacefully in his sleep after a long illness on July 1, 2020.

Gallery

Solo exhibitions

Publications by Hallett

; Amsterdam. Documenta; Germany. Sonja Henie-Nils Onstad Collection; Oslo, Norway. Birmingham Central Library; UK. Schomburg Centre for Research in Black Culture; New York Public Library; United States.
Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town; Bo-Kaap Museum, Cape Town; District Six Museum, Cape Town; Rhodes University, Grahamstown; Mayibuye Centre, University of the Western Cape; Sached Educational Trust, Mowbray; Red Cross Children’s Hospital, Cape Town; Metropolitan Life Insurance; Bensusan Museum of Photography, the Market Theatre Complex, Johannesburg; The Open Learning Systems Education Trust, Johannesburg; South Africa.

Films