In 1986, a year in which the end of apartheid was not yet in sight but the impetus of resisting the state was in full swing and somewhat fashionable, a shop called So Modern in Rockey Street, Yeoville, Johannesburg’s vibrant crossover suburb, invited me to design two ‘politically aware’ T-shirts for them.
For the first, I used a photograph which had appeared in a British newspaper of Nelson and Winnie Mandela on their wedding day, with some text. For the second, I made a colourful ‘rainbow-pull’ design incorporating the clauses of the Freedom Charter (unbanned in 1984, but still widely considered subversive). The trendy So Modern reacted with horror to both my designs, saying that to sell either of them would result in jail for all concerned.
So I and my partner at that time, Bruce Gordon, started to print and distribute the T-shirts ourselves, and uncounted hundreds were sold.
Wanted: a Freedom Charter T-shirt
Now the Museum of Modern Art in New York has asked for one of the Freedom Charter T-shirts for their collection of ephemeral material, to be displayed in a vitrine to support an exhibition of South African prints to open next March. But I no longer have one.
Does anyone still have a Freedom Charter T-shirt tucked away somewhere they would be prepared to donate/sell? If so, please email me at suewill@iafrica.com
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