Sue Williamson

Artist Date: b.1941 South Africa

Title: Deka Yusuf Farrh and Nisa (from the Better Lives series)

Date of Work: 2003

Medium: pigment ink on cotton rag paper

Signed: signed, dated and numbered 2/6 in pencil along the bottom margin

Dimensions: image size: 117.5 x 91 cm

Exhibited: Apartheid Museum, Johannesburg, Can’t Remember, Can’t Forget, 21 March to 31 May 2017, another example from the edition exhibited.
6th Beijing International Art Biennale, Beijing, 2015, another example from the edition exhibited.
Wertz Gallery, Atlanta, Hotels and Better Lives, 2 February to 20 March 2007, another example from the edition exhibited.
Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg, Hotels and Better Lives, 2005, another example from the edition exhibited.
João Ferreira Gallery, Cape Town, Hotels and Better Lives, 11 to 28 May 2005, another example from the edition exhibited.
Michael Stevenson Contemporary, Cape Town, Staged Realities: Composure, 24 March to 8 May 2004, another example from the edition exhibited.


Literature: Williamson, Sue. (2015). Sue Williamson: Life and Work. Milan: Skira Editore S.p.A., another example from the edition illustrated on p.170.
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. (2009). Darkroom: Photography and New Media in South Africa, 1950 to the Present. USA: Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, another example from the edition illustrated n.p.
cf. Williamson, S. (2009). South African Art Now. New York: Collins Design, another example from the series illustrated in colour on p.14.
Dak'Art 2004: 6th Biennial of Contemporary African Art. (2004). Senegal: Dak’Art, another example from the edition illustrated in the catalogue, n.p.

Notes: The portrait of Deka Yusuf Farrh and her daughter Nitshma is one of six in the Better Lives series, about immigrants from other African countries who come to Cape Town to seek a better life.
In 1998, Deka Yusuf Farrh’s father was shot in his shop by robbers. Deka left Somalia the next day. She was pregnant at the time. At the Namibian border, she was arrested, as the Namibian officials did not recognise her Somalian passport. Deka spent six months in jail there, where she gave birth to her daughter, Nitshma. Eventually her mother sent her money to bribe officials and Deka got to Cape Town, where at the time of the portrait she was surviving by running a cigarette stand next to the Kimberley Hotel.
Sue Williamson