The famous South African photojournalist, Peter Magubane, who documented the daily suffering of South Africans for decades, has died at the age of 91. Peter Magubane gained fame after joining Drum magazine in 1955 as an apprentice driver and then as one of the few black photographers covering the era of repression.
A year later, a historic photo he took in an affluent neighborhood in Johannesburg showed a white girl sitting on a long bench labeled “For Europeans Only,” while a brunette girl sat behind her, combing the child’s hair. In the 1960s, in the rise of the anti-apartheid movement, his lenses recorded the arrest of Nelson Mandela and the banning of the now-ruling African National Congress party, according to (Sky News).
A decade later, he won international awards for his coverage of the student uprising in Soweto. Peter Magubane has long been subjected to harassment, attacks, and arrests. Starting in 1969, he was thrown into solitary confinement for 586 days. But Magubane continued taking pictures until he was appointed Mandela’s official photographer in the 1990s.
“He was someone who made very great sacrifices for the freedom we enjoy today,” his granddaughter, Olongile Magubane, told Reuters. She added, “He was lucky and lived to see the country change for the better.” Peter Magubane was born in 1932 in the Johannesburg suburb of Vrededorp, now called Bedgview, and grew up in Sophiatown, which was once a center for famous black artists and was eventually destroyed during the apartheid regime.
His daughter, Fikile Magubane, said he died peacefully around midday. He would have turned 92 years old on January 18.
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