Assistant:
Lauren Theunissen
Laura Pannack visits A4 from London for five weeks as a resident. While here, she continues her work with young people that has spanned continents, connecting with teenagers across Cape Town – its suburbs and neighbourhoods – particularly in places where apartheid spacial planning deliberately disenfranchised communities. Pannack documents the explorations and resiliences of youth, while engaging the teens she works with in photographic workshops.
The residency became a research trip for Pannack towards what would become her long durational project 'The Journey Home from School' (2024). She self organised and planned a return trip to Cape Town to visit the young people she'd met during her residency, continuing to document their journeys from school that are oftentimes unsafe, and not without threats of harm from surrounding violence. Her workshops with children explored poetry, cyanotypes and photographs, co-creating material with young people that encouraged entangled authorship and self study.
"I sought to work with young people who have very unique personal experiences of tackling the growth into adulthood in Cape Town.
Ronaldo splits her life and accommodation between Mitchells Plain and Heideveld. I worked with Ronaldo to explore how through photography we could both create pictures that give a rare insight into her world. We looked at how her identity requires more than just courage and curiosity. Ronaldo shares her story of what it is like to grow up in The Cape Flats.
Ivan is home schooled and lives in the beautiful but sparse area of Noordhoek. His father passed away due to covid. He takes refuge in climbing over the wall to meet his best friend Julia, who is fourteen." (LP, 2023)
"Project Hope runs a youth centre from their base, which is the local Church.
The pastor, Andrew May, allows young people of any age to use the church to stay safe from the hostile streets in the area and Project Hope offers social activities, meals, as well as family support and advice." (LP, 2023)
"Each day children leave the headquarters, making their way through the streets to the only playground in Vrygrond. Their loud singing raises the alarm to other children to join them. Within minutes the initial small group grows to sometimes hundreds.
At the playground the charity provides games and supervision. They play in a safe place until the sun lowers and the space becomes a very different sort of playground occupied by adults." (LP, 2023)
A one-day workshop where Laura Pannack shared the camera with participants who explored how to stage and photograph an image.
