Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin, who were both editors of the influential COLORS magazine, now collaborate to make extraordinary work. Ghetto (published 2003), for example is their journey through 12 modern ghettos, from South Africa to Patagonia. In each place the inhabitants were asked the same questions - 'How did you get here? Who is in power? Where do you go to be alone?' In a South African gaol, they photographed and interviewed members of the different gangs who to all intent and purpose run the prisons: to claim membership of a specific gang, each individual has to have memorised the intricate detail of an imaginary military uniform that they can recount - down to the positioning of buttons on cuffs.
Looking at the portraits of each prisoner with the text in which they give the precise account of their rank and status through the description of the uniform they carry in their head is to be given a third image - of someone who knows their precise rank and status within the institution.
It is really powerful work - as interesting for the way they create really powerful and relevant documentary stories with words and images as for the way they work together. Really worth looking at - and reading!
Red House is a collection of photographs of marks and drawings made on the Red House in Sulaymaniyah in Kurdish northern Iraq - originally the HQ of the Ba'athist party and a place of torture and death for many of the oppressed Kurds.
The duo, who are South African, based in London, are showing films and giving a talk on March 4th at 6.15 at the Gate Cinema in Notting Hill - catch it if you can! [Look for the Picturehouse ArtSpace].