Personal

Booyle has since then worked as freelance photographer and for the production industry. In 2005, he was one of the founding members of a photographers collective, consisting of photographers from historically disadvantaged communities and publishing his book "South Africa at Liberty". In this book he sets out to capture the essence of the eclectic rainbow nation, post Apartheid.

Largely taken in the public space, his photos reveal intimate moments of ordinary people, mainly living in the periphery, going about their ordinary lives. He highlights unusual stories, exposing everyday life of vulnerable and disadvantaged people, engaged in a basic struggle for survival on the city margins. His subjects – street children, factory workers, exhausted commuter, protestors during political rallies – are persons, who have maintained a sense of dignity that not even the harshest circumstances could erode.
 
Why did you start taking pictures? I started taking pictures in 1992, my second last year of high school, when I received a camera as a gift from my father. The camera as a device really fascinated me, and I wanted to learn how to use it. I then realized that I had stumbled on to a way of recording the way I looked at the world. I also recognized that in my hands, the camera was like a passport into the lives of the people I found myself surrounded by. 
 
What was the role of photography during Apartheid? Before the first democratic elections in 1994, which saw Nelson Mandela become the first democratically elected president, photography played a role only as a political and journalistic means. Photography was used solely to document the Anti-Apartheid fight and to inform the world about what was happening at the time in South Africa. State controlled news agencies used photography for propaganda purposes. Photography was also used to classify people on the bases of their race and their tribal belonging.
 
What was the main focus of your photography? Initially my focus was on people in my surroundings, my family and friends, though I always had a passion for buildings. Upon my return from a trip from Europe for example, my mother refused to pay for processing my films because there were very few photos of me and my traveling partner, mainly buildings and completely unrelated people. In hindsight perhaps this should have been a clue as to what was to come. 
 
How has your focus changed over time? My focus had not changed very much over the years, in the sense that I still love photographing people, whereas in the past it was my personal curiosity, which then got overshadowed by assignments for newspapers and NGO’s.
 
Which methods do you apply in your photography? I really like to use the term ‘lurk’ in the sense that I tend to lurk on the periphery until I blend into the environment. Though in some instances there is no way to blend in, in which case it was very useful to have a colourful upbringing involving various socio-economic groupings, which allowed me to engage with the people and environment I found myself in. My approach has always included my perspective, accompanied by an interest in what makes people «tick». My perspective I guess had always been informed by the question «what is there for me to learn?», from the person or situation about myself.
 
Can you tell us more about your book «South Africa at Liberty»? It was the final book in a series of photo books on unknown sub-saharan photographers published by Belgian art foundation «Africalia», together with «Stichting Kunstboek». The book traces the first 23 years of my sub-saharan photography. It was published in 2016 and launched at the National Theatre in Brussels, the University of Ghent and a year later in Cape Town, Johannesburg and finally at the photographers gallery book shop in London. Personally for me the book was a homage to the people of a country that I call home.
 
You currently live in Switzerland. What do you hope to achieve here with regard to your work? I have the intention to start the process of revisiting a now 30 year archive of my work so that I can have the ‘look back’ I had considered all those years before to see if, how I have changed. I also would like to make the work accessible to honour the people I have photographed over the years, and I believe that Switzerland is the right place to do that. I am also shooting varied events and people here in the continuation of my practice. There are also some projects I am working on producing while I am here, but more about that when they have been realized!

Interested in the book? More infos here