Africa do Sul: Pretoria

This picture continues with a theme that dominated Ricardo Rangel's archive before independence in Mozambique, which was race relations. After Mozambique's independence in 1975, there still were other places in Southern Africa, specifically South Africa, where racial divisions and discrimination continued. The woman sitting appears to be discomforted by Rangel's presence and turns her head away from the camera's lens in an effort to remain unidentified. But, in photographing her discomfort, Rangel also captures the irony of the moment. Blacks and whites, as the frame depicts, walked next to each other in South Africa, but they did not sit next to one another. The original negative of the image does not exist, and the picture is currently stored within Rangel's private archive under the heading "Apartheid." Rangel's "Apartheid" collection also includes another image of him in his swimming trunks on an unidentified beach in South Africa, standing under a sign that reads, "Bathing Area for Coloured Community." By picturing these aspects of South Africa's society, Rangel was also simultaneously illustrating how someone from Mozambique with a camera fits in under the apartheid laws and the physical spaces he was able to travel. This photograph provides an interesting comparison when considered in relation to his images of colonial Mozambique.