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Zimaseka "Zim" Salusalu, Gugulethu, Cape Town

Zanele Muholi

Photography

These portraits are from Zanele Muholi’s project Faces and Phases (2006–14), in which the artist documents the breadth of identities contained within the Black lesbian and transgender community in South Africa and its diaspora. Despite the legalization of gay marriage in South Africa in 2006 (the first African country to do so), hate crimes against the country’s Black LGBTQ community occur with devastating frequency, as is confirmed by the first-person testimonials Muholi collects when she photographs her subjects. An insistence on visibility poses risks of discrimination and violence, yet it is also a defiant assertion of self-possessed presence and resistance, a refusal to be silenced or shamed because of one’s identity.
MEDIUM Gelatin silver print
DATES 2011
DIMENSIONS sheet: 33 7/8 × 23 7/8 in. (86 × 60.6 cm) image: 29 15/16 × 19 15/16 in. (76 × 50.6 cm) frame: 34 1/8 × 24 1/8 in. (86.7 × 61.3 cm)  (show scale)
COLLECTIONS Photography
ACCESSION NUMBER 2012.72.2
CREDIT LINE Robert A. Levinson Fund
MUSEUM LOCATION This item is not on view
CAPTION Zanele Muholi (South African, born 1972). Zimaseka "Zim" Salusalu, Gugulethu, Cape Town, 2011. Gelatin silver print, sheet: 33 7/8 × 23 7/8 in. (86 × 60.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Robert A. Levinson Fund, 2012.72.2. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Image courtesy of Yancey Richardson Gallery, CUR.2012.72.2_Yancey_Richardson_Gallery_photograph.jpg)
EDITION Edition: 2/8 + 2AP
IMAGE overall, CUR.2012.72.2_Yancey_Richardson_Gallery_photograph.jpg. Image courtesy of Yancey Richardson Gallery
"CUR" at the beginning of an image file name means that the image was created by a curatorial staff member. These study images may be digital point-and-shoot photographs, when we don\'t yet have high-quality studio photography, or they may be scans of older negatives, slides, or photographic prints, providing historical documentation of the object.
RIGHTS STATEMENT © Zanele Muholi
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