Photo: © Tom van der Leij — Transkei in Transition, Bull Celebration
Twenty years is an ideal span for a documentary photography project. The former homeland of Transkei is one of the poorest and most remote parts of South Africa, an austere place where Black South Africans were forcibly relocated during apartheid. It is also home to what may be the country’s most beautiful stretch of coastline, the Wild Coast.
Nelson Mandela was born in this Xhosa region, a place marked by deep poverty as well as white fortune seekers. Tom van der Leij visited it frequently, photographing local residents and publishing extensively about the area. On his latest trip, in December 2021, the photographer tracked down the people he had photographed years earlier and invited them to tell their stories.
How had their lives changed over the previous two decades in the new South Africa? The result was a compelling exploration of tradition and change, disappointment and hope, and death and life. It all comes together in the documentary photography project Transkei in Transition.
Amsterdam-based travel photographer Tom van der Leij (born 1975) previously exhibited Africa Plays Soccer! and Women@Work, an ongoing photo exhibition.
As a travel photographer and travel editor, he has traveled around the world and visited more than one hundred countries. His work has appeared in a wide range of media, from leading travel magazines and websites to international trade journals and travel guides. He briefly studied in South Africa in 2000 and has returned every year since, describing it as his second homeland.
This project was made possible in part by the Steunfonds Freelance Journalisten and co-funder Cultuur Explosie.
At the time of the article, Van der Leij owned a private tour-guide company in Amsterdam, www.tomstraveltours.com, offering custom tours in the Netherlands and Belgium. He also offered private cultural and photography tours to his beloved South Africa.
View more photographs by Tom van der Leij here.
Transkei in Transition — front room of the Zuid-Afrikahuis (free by appointment)
Keizersgracht 141, Amsterdam
Run: February 14 through May 26, 2022
