Teachers Private View
Thursday 15th January 5.15pm – 7pm
Enjoy a guided tour of the Ponte City exhibition with the curator and find out more about the schools programme.
Exhibition runs 6th Dec 2014 – 26th April 2015
at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Queen St Edinburgh EH2 1JD
https://www.nationalgalleries.org/whatson/exhibitions/ponte-city
Please book by contacting lconacher@nationalgalleries.org
This photographic exhibition documents the Ponte City tower block building in Johannesburg, South Africa from 2007 to 2012.
Potential curriculum links: (especially suitable for secondary school pupils)
• People, place and environment
• Social issues – apartheid / equality and diversity / poverty
• Comparison with Scottish cities eg. the demolition of the Red Road Flats in Glasgow
• Values, beliefs and cultures
• Global Citizenship
• Expressive Arts
Ponte City was built for white people at the height of apartheid, but with the end of the Group Areas Act in 1991 became a refuge for black newcomers from the townships and rural areas, and then immigrants from elsewhere in Africa.
The building entered into a period of decline; by the turn of the century Ponte City symbolised urban decay and was perceived as the epicentre of crime, prostitution and drug dealing in Johannesburg. In 2007 developers evicted half of the residents and began gutting the empty apartments, but financial difficulties halted the renovation process before completion.
During this time artists Subotzky and Waterhouse began to document the building by:
• interviewing the remaining tenants
• photographing every door in the 54-storey structure
• photographing the view from every window
• photographing TV screens in the flats where residents were watching television
• collecting documents and other debris from the abandoned units
