South Africa - the place I call home. A violent country, scarred by inequality and racial divide from its apartheid and colonial past. Once a year I visit my mother in the Riebeeck Valley. A picturesque place nestled in the Western Cape on the slopes of the Kasteelberg Mountain. Its’ landscape is almost entirely made up of farmland, dating back to the early 1700s.

In early 2021, I became aware of the valley’s forced segregation past. A fundamental truth that is not always mentioned in the history books, and influences the valley’s landscape to this day. In 1965, after years of marginalisation and racism towards the coloured community of Riebeeck Kasteel, the residents of the suburb of Oukloof were forcefully removed, their houses bulldozed and resettled outside of town - in a newly constructed settlement called Esterhof.

Today the formerly occupied land is predominately made up of farmland, exporting olives and plums to such international clients as Tesco. Many of the Esterhof residents work on those farms under adverse conditions. Despite its official prohibition, the partial payment of wages with alcohol, known as the dop system still appears to persist.

Since the end of apartheid, there has been very little socio-economic atonement in South Africa - wealth and privilege are still very much held by a small white minority to the exclusion of the majority of South Africans. With Riebeek-Kasteel still visibly racially segregated from Esterhof, by a train track.

This work in progress deals with the effects of land appropriation and portrays those directly affected by the forced removals. It is interested in the legacy of past injustices. Capturing the hopes and dreams of a new generation in an attempt to understand the harsh reality of life in Esterhof and the valley. It also serves as a memorial - a generational inheritance, a bridge between old and new, past and present.