Girl From Kliptown
Acrylics
2006
18 X 22"
$400
This is a little girl I met in a famous township within Soweto near Johannesburg called Kliptown. It was on a short field trip type of thing and she was very soft-spoken, so I didn't catch her name, but she held my hand the entire time we were being introduced to people throughout the neighborhood. Townships are informal settlements spread out all over South Africa, especially on the outskirts of cities. They are left over from the apartheid era and many black families live in or come from them today. NieuCommunities has connections with a lot of people from townships, including churches, schools, and families. Many of our closest friends live within such communities.
Blockade R
Acrylics
2006
22 X 14"
$375
This little girl is from a township called Soshanguve, just outside of Pretoria, where NieuCommunities is located. The neighborhoods in Sosh, as we call it, are split up into sections, or blocks, from A to Z. This girl goes to a creche (a daycare) within Block R. I did this and "Girl from Kliptown" after my first visit to South Africa in August of 2006. During the two-week trip, we visited a variety of people the NieuCommunities staff had gotten to know personally. Many of them I came to know well myself during my apprenticeship year last year, and I will get to continue in relationship with this coming year as I move onto staff.