Primary Artist: Terry Forman
Created: San Francisco Collective, 1985
Medium: Silkscreen
Dimensions: 14.5″ x 22.5
The Uitenhage/Langa massacre: On March 21, 1985, members of the South African police opened fire on a crowd of people going to a funeral for a person who had been slain by the apartheid police on March 17th. They were heading towards the house where the funeral was held when the police blocked the road with armored vehicles and ordered the crowd to disperse. When the crowd failed to comply, police opened fire killing 35 people and leaving at least 27 wounded. The shooting occurred on Sharpeville Day, a day of remembrance for a similar shooting in 1961, which had become a major symbol of state violence against Black South Africans. Azania was used by the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania as the anti-colonial name for South Africa.
Image: Photograph of a South African woman’s face showing through an African mask in the foreground.
Words: Poem by an Azanian Patriot with subscript “Sharpeville 1960-Uitenhage 1985” “We are not here to mourn those who have died, those detained, those banned, those imprisoned on Robben Island. Whatever dirges we have had in mind shall be transformed into the war songs, battle hymns and victory cries of all our black heroes and heroines in the ages through.”
Color: black, green, yellow, magenta on white card stock.
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