Southern Africa is heating at twice the global average. With the failure of the UN multi-lateral process to rapidly phase out fossil fuels, the world has lost the opportunity to prevent a 1.5°C overshoot. South Africa and the region have to brace for 3°C of heating. The country is completely unprepared for this post-normal reality.
Through ten years of photographic documentation, this exhibition and book brings into focus unfolding climate shocks, injustice and resistance post a 1°C overshoot at the global level. It furnishes powerful insights into the structural drivers and complexity of climate extremes, while foregrounding how the meaning of weather has changed. The deployed photographic optic brings clarity to the notion of climate risk in everyday life. Moreover, this work, as a photographic archive, also provides forensic evidence for how an uncaring and criminalised political leadership, addicted to fossil fuels, is force marching the country into climate disaster.
Ultimately the photographic medium echoes the warnings of climate science but also amplifies the case for climate justice solutions to secure a livable, just and democratic future for all. As author and curator of this exhibition, Vishwas Satgar, wrestles with the question: what is photography's role in these times of planetary crisis? All are invited to this exhibition opening and book launch to share in the dialogue.
An exhibition and the book bring together a decade of documentary photography, research and activism, to illuminate SA’s deepening climate crisis.
The exhibition is on display at the Wits Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment, while the book is available at the Wits Origin Centre and at selected bookshops.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Vishwas Satgar is Professor of International Relations at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. He is the editor of the Democratic Marxism series and is the principal investigator for the Emancipatory Futures Studies in the Anthropocene project.
'Facing the Heat in South Africa' is published by Jacana Media
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