South African photographer Santu Mofokeng, chronicler of post-apartheid life, dies at 64

Santu Mofokeng, the South African photographer known for documenting black citizens' lives during the country's transition from apartheid, has died. Born in Soweto, Johannesburg, he began his career as a teenage street photographer and darkroom assistant before freelancing as a news photographer as apartheid ended. In the early 1980s, he co-founded the Afrapix collective with Omar Badsha and other photographers, focusing on resistance imagery. From 1988 to 1998, he served as photographer and researcher for the University of the Witwatersrand's African Studies Institute Oral History Project, receiving an honorary doctorate there in 2016. His international recognition included the 1991 Ernest Cole Scholarship to study at New York's International Center of Photography and the 1992 Mother Jones Award for Africa. Mofokeng presented 25 solo exhibitions between 1990 and 2016 and participated in major global events like Documenta 11, the Venice Biennale in 2007 and 2013, and the Rencontres de Bamako. He won the International Photography Prize in 2016. His work captured both rural and urban landscapes, revealing the complexities of South Africa's societal transformation.