Many South Africans believed in apartheid as an inyanga, as in the sjambok, as they believed in everything which made it unnecessary for them to forge their own destiny; they loved their fear, it reconciled them with themselves, it suspended the faculties of the spirit like a sneeze. Apartheid was a roof. And under this roof life was difficult, many aspects of life were concealed, proscribed. People tried to live their lives in dignity but their joy was tainted with guilt and defiance.

In South Africa, many black people spend their lives chasing shadows. While the expression chasing shadows has quixotic connotations in English, in indigenous languages the expression represents the pursuit of something real, something capable of action, of causing effects — a chase perhaps joined in order to forestall a threat or danger.

Seriti in Sesotho (my mother tongue), does not readily translate. The word is often translated only as shadow, unwittingly combining the meanings of moriti and seriti. The word seriti overlaps the word meaning shadow, but the absence of light is not all there is to seriti. In everyday usage seriti can mean anything from aura, presence, dignity, confidence, spirit, essence, status, wellbeing and power — power to attract good fortune and to ward off bad luck and disease.

The demise of apartheid has brought to the fore a crisis of spiritual insecurity for the many who believe in the spiritual dimensions of life. Today, this consciousness of spiritual forces, which helped people cope with the burdens of apartheid, is being undermined by mutations in nature. If apartheid was a scourge the new threat is a virus: invisible perils both.

Nothing forces a backward glance like a threat. The Chinese say that our body is the memory of our ancestors. This is an ominous proposition since apartheid is an impossible ancestor, inappropriate and unsuitable. Whenever we come under threat we remember who we are and where we come from and we respond accordingly. The word remember needs elaboration. Re-membering is a process by which we restore to the body forgotten memories. The body, in this case, is the landscape — on whose skin and belly histories and myths are projected — which is central to forging national identity.

One can’t travel far within this country before coming upon shadowed ground of negative remembrances of violence and tragedy. This partly explains my peregrinations here and in foreign lands. This journey that began at home in Soweto took me to places invested with spiritual meaning in the Free State: concentration camps, burial grounds in Middleburg, Greylingstad and Brandfort in my effort to embody the South African landscape.

In 1997 I started to visit the shadow grounds in Europe and Asia. I wanted to see how other countries were dealing with places associated with negative memories. In South Africa, we were still discussing the fates of Robben Island, Vlakplaats and similarly affected sites at the time. Suffice to say, my forays into the metropoles of Europe have since convinced me of the futility of this enquiry. There is no universal model to follow. My efforts at this point are tantamount to chasing shadows.

The work in the exhibition, is a kind of a statement, an account of events, people and places in pictorial narrative; a bill duly rendered in a selection spanning the twelve years before and after apartheid.

The exhibition Santu Mofokeng has been realised through a partnership between Autograph ABP and Iziko South African National Gallery.