Emile Ebrahim Kelly

Hout Bay, Cape Town, April 2010

Click the image above to open a gallery of portraits. You can go left or right by clicking your mouse on the left/right side of the image, or you can use the arrow keys on your keyboard, or even N (next) and P (previous). The options are endless… Well, not endless, there’s just three. The colours on some images might be a bit off, but you’ve all probably got dodgy un-calibrated screens anyway, so what does it matter? Would love to hear what anyone thinks in the comments sections. A little bit of waffle and some out-takes below. Enjoy!

Continue reading »

Gebane - South Africa

The ash cloud tried to hold us down, but we’re back! I was absolutely rubbish at blogging while I was in South Africa, so I’m going to do retrospective posts about the places we visited, accompanied by the images. I have already scanned all our negs, so those posts will start to appear soon. The image above is a little taster!

Still getting to grips with the 5×4, but here’s some more portraits:

Ali and friend, Players - Hackney Marshes, 31/01/10

Continue reading »

Took a 5×4 field camera out to Hackney Marshes last Sunday, heres an image:

Gerry, Referee - Hackney Marshes, 24/01/10

A couple weeks ago I shot some portraits with Vincent, my dad, who was going to be one of my South Africans living in Britain. The portraits aren’t particularly interesting and were never intended to be the final product, just a starting point onto which I will layer ideas for the next shoot. The plan was to get the format for my portraits finalised with him, then start arranging shoots/interviews with my other subjects. Since then I’ve hit a bit of a wall mentally, which is why I haven’t posted these up already. My problem is basically the time constraints on this mini-project, so I had to decide to either make very simple portraits with lots of subjects or narrow down my subjects in order to play more with the portrait. I have now decided on the latter and have changed the project to focus simply on my immediate family, all of whom have differing relationships with both South Africa and Britain. These portraits will be a response to the Griqualand photographs I found at the National Archives. This blog is supposed to document the entirety of my process, so despite my not liking them, here are a few of the results of that initial shoot (apologies about the slightly off-key colours):

Vincent at the park

Continue reading »

I’ve been back from Basque Spain for about a week now, unfortunately various events meant I didn’t get to work on a road trip/portrait project as I had intended. But being back at school will force me to be photographic and will mean the beginning of the real progress on this project. i.e. much more regular updates here! I have received the first brief of the year and I’m quite excited about the possibilities it presents, will have the statement for my first mini-project up here by Thursday. My photographs from the National archives came through and I’ll be basing my first project around some of them, I’ll also be doing blog posts around them throughout the next week. Having only managed to shoot 2 rolls of film during my trip (and without any purpose/direction), I haven’t got much to show. But in the spirit of getting things flowing I’ve chucked it up here anyway:

British tourists hungry for sun, ferry from Plymouth to Santander, September 2009

Continue reading »

I’m going on a road trip to Spain today and it got me thinking about the act of making photographs while traveling. I obviously feel an urge to photograph, but I also feel conflicted about this urge: who am I to try and create an insightful representation of a place which I’ll only be in for a matter of days? For me the obvious answer is to not even attempt to; I have to make the pictures about something else. My position as a foreigner passing through has to be central. My last couple of trips abroad have involved long journeys on sleeper trains, during which I started to play with taking photographs from the train window. You have this constantly changing landscape in front of you and the whole act feels like the traveling experience boiled down to its essence. Here’s a couple of examples:

Somewhere between Nairobi & Mombasa, Kenya, January 2009

Continue reading »

Ajax Cape Town supporter flying the flag - December 2007

South Africa can feel football obsessed at times, obviously its not a big deal for everyone and I will be looking at this further within the project, but those who do follow the beautiful game pretty much live it and breathe it. One young member of my family, Saige, once cried his eyes out because Talia, his mum/my cousin, refused to officially change his name to Stephen Gerrard. That’s the kind of passion I’m talking about. The big English teams have huge followings, and it would be easy to ignore the South African league, but I was determined to experience it last time I was out there, so i persuaded my girlfriend, brother and a mate to come see Ajax Cape Town play Mamelodi Sundowns.

Continue reading »

Jackie Heyns - District Six in the heyday - from the book 'District Six Revisited'

District Six lies just south east of Cape Town city centre, a conspicuous hole in the landscape. It’s a place in which I have family history, I expect the same is true for most people with Cape Town roots. In the early 19th Century the area had been known as Zonnebloem Farming Estate, but the borders of Cape Town were expanding and in 1867 it became the ‘Sixth Municipal District of Cape Town’. By all accounts District Six was a lively place, a vibrant mix of people and cultures. Being so close to the docks made the area a gateway to the city, and although the population was mainly coloured/cape Malay/black, other races could also be found there, from Irish and Portuguese sailors to Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe and Russia. For the residents of District Six, it was the only place to be. The home of Jazz and the heartbeat of the city. The vibrancy of District Six is described famously by Richard Rive, a childhood friend of my Grandmother, in the novel ‘Buckingham Palace, District Six‘.

Continue reading »