Shadow and light
Jurgen Schadeberg’s illuminating vision
In any other country it would have been an uncomplicated photo shoot, a glamorous young star posing in her bikini for a magazine spread. But this was SA in the early 1950s, where life was far from simple. The Immorality Act was at the heart of its circles of hell and forbade sexual intercourse between “Europeans” and anyone not “European”, and the act was enforced dogmatically by the state.
The photo shoot featured Dolly Rathebe, the blues queen and movie star, and had been arranged for Drum magazine by its music editor, Todd Matshikiza. The photographer was Jurgen Schadeberg, a young German who had emigrated to SA after World War 2.
When Schadeberg had been introduced to Rathebe by Matshikiza he had been impressed with her good looks and intelligence. She was badly dressed, though, in men’s shoes, an ill-fitting skirt and a man’s jacket, and exposure in Drum certainly helped her transformation into a glamorous diva.
In his memoirs, The Way I See It, Schadeberg tells how the shoot started with Rathebe posing at Zoo Lake, Johannesburg, against the trunk of a willow tree in a loose flowery dress. A small group of onlookers gathered. Then an elderly man pointed his walking stick at the two and shouted: “This should not be allowed!” The photographer and his model left quietly for the office.
On the way back to the city Rathebe suddenly said: “What about the bikini?” She had included one in her bag of modelling outfits and accessories.
“We need to go to the beach,” he replied jokingly. “Four hundred miles. Have you got enough petrol?” she retorted.
Then Schadeberg had an idea. Right at the edge of Kensington, where his mother lived, there was a mine dump the size of a football field with golden sand, perfect for a beach backdrop.
They stumbled to the top of the mine dump with their bags of camera equipment and modelling attire. Schadeberg looked over the edge and noticed a man in a straw hat, who was watering his plants with a hosepipe, staring up at them. Rathebe had joked that she wasn’t going to put on her bikini for suburban whiteys and they moved to the middle of the mine dump.
Rathebe was a natural and there was much laughing and banter as she posed in her bikini. After shooting four rolls of film, Schadeberg was satisfied he had more than enough material for the magazine.
While he was packing his bag he saw a shadow come over Dolly’s face. Two uniformed policemen appeared over the dump followed by two more, slipping on the sand, breathing heavily and all shouting at once.
A big cop with stripes on his uniform shouted at Schadeberg: “Wat doen jy hier, seuntjie?” (What are you doing here, boy?) With his red face inches from the photographer’s he hissed: “Moenie beweeg nie.” (Don’t move.)
Another cop shouted in a piercing voice: “Soek bewyse!” (Look for proof!)
The four rushed backwards and forwards like bloodhounds as they searched the sand looking for evidence of illegal acts.
The big cop strode to Dolly, who was standing quietly as the drama unfolded,
“Trek jou rok op meisie.” (Pull up your dress, girl.) She lifted her dress above her knees.
“Ek wil jou broek sien!” ( I want to see your pants!) She slowly lifted her dress further up her thigh. “Moenie cheeky wees nie, hoor?” (Don’t get cheeky, you hear?)
Rathebe lifted her dress so the cops could just see her bikini bottom.
The two were manhandled off the mine dump.
Next to Schadeberg’s Plymouth was a pickup van and a police car and two more cops. Six policemen to investigate an act deemed a crime only by the apartheid state.
The cop who had Schadeberg in a grip shouted: “We got ourselves a bloody Kraut!” Rathebe was thrown in the back of the police van while
Schadeberg was bundled into the back seat of the police car.
At the police station in downtown Johannesburg the cop behind the desk looked intently into his eyes.
“We don’t mix with these people. As a German you should know they are different, like children. You can’t trust them. They are lazy.”
When Schadeberg arrived back at the Drum office Rathebe was already there, laughing with the others about the incident.
Schadeberg had grown up in Berlin. When he was 10 years old he was living in a fashionable part of the city with his mother. It was 1941 and Germany was at the height of its power, having beaten most of Europe into submission. The bars and theatres were open, the shops were well stocked and apart from a few air raids the good times kept rolling. Schadeberg describes his mom as a strikingly good-looking actress who played minor roles and dressed with the glamour expected of an aspiring star. The two shared their home with Peter, the white budgie that was allowed to fly around when the windows were closed. Young Schadeberg called his mother Rosie and she introduced him as her brother.
Every day there were long rants on the radio by
The Leader. His menacing shouts frightened the boy.
Schadeberg was ordered to report for duty as a member of the JungvolPk — Hitler Youth movement — and forced to wear the uniform of black shorts and brown shirt. They were taught songs with lyrics such as “On the lake swim corpses with their stomachs sliced open.” He soon found a way to duck out of it.
Eventually Berliners were forced to face the reality of the global conflagration their country had unleashed. In 1943 Schadeberg recalls seeing the sky darken with 500 enemy planes flying in formation. Meanwhile, Rosie went skiing in the Alps, leaving Jurgen at home.
Jurgen and his friend, Hans, hunted cellars for food and collected smashed furniture for firewood. They stole butter and sausages from a Gestapo house that was on fire and fled before guards could catch them.
In the days before their surrender, German soldiers fought hand-to-hand combat with the Soviets. There were the terrifying sounds of explosions, machinegun fire and tanks rolling down the streets. There was no water or gas or electricity. There were piles of rubble where buildings had once stood. Schadeberg came home one night to find his mother dancing cheek-to-cheek with a sergeant to the voice of Marlene Dietrich on the record player.
Burning tanks and rotting corpses littered the streets. Victorious Russians dragged women from bomb shelters and their screams pierced the sky.
After the war Rosie and her new husband moved to SA and Schadeberg followed. In mid-1951 he heard about a magazine for black readers called The African Drum. Everybody told him it would be disastrous to his career to work for a black publication “about natives”.
Schadeberg formed a close working relationship with Henry Nxumalo, one of SA’s greatest investigative journalists. The two went undercover to expose the slave conditions on the potato and mealie farms around Bethal. In 1947 the Rev Michael Scott had investigated the horror. A worker from Malawi (then Nyasaland) had been promised a job as a waiter and only discovered he had been tricked when he reached Bethal. A 14-year-old boy from the Northern Transvaal thought he was going to a job at a clothing factory in Springs.
The abuse on the farms had been entrenched decades before. In 1929 the Bethal magistrate’s court found a farmer guilty of tying a labourer by his feet from a tree and flogging him to death. Atrocities that made it to court were only the tip of the iceberg.
The fearless Nxumalo wanted to go undercover on one of the notorious farms. Schadeberg would take the photos.
The two went to the recruiting office where a large number of men, many in rags and worn shorts, were standing around. Henry took his place in the queue and Schadeberg snuck around taking pictures. He peeped through a grimy window and photographed Nxumalo standing in front of a desk with two white men sitting behind it filling out papers. Nxumalo stepped up to the desk and one of the men held up a pencil. He stretched out and touched it. This was the way illiterate labourers “signed” their contracts.
About 10 minutes later Nxumalo and his group, led by a policeman, came out of the office. He winked at Schadeberg and dropped a matchbox. Inside he had written Sonneblom, the name of a farm.
For two weeks nobody heard from Nxumalo and everybody started to panic. Schadeberg set off for Bethal to find him.
In the town he started asking for directions to Sonneblom farm. “I must have appeared strange to the locals — as if I had come from the moon — what with my small car seeming very out of place among the farmers’ trucks and bakkies and my pronounced German accent, but I managed to get the information I needed.
“I saw several white farmers in khaki shorts, shirts and large floppy hats ordering black workers to load supplies onto their trucks. The workers were barefoot and dressed in rags. Some were wearing filthy potato sacks with crude holes for their heads and arms.”
After driving for some time he saw a sign “Sonneblom — Van der Merwe — Privaat”. He turned onto a dirt road flanked by potato fields. In the distance he spotted a long row of workers, some carrying large baskets. They were moving slowly towards him, bending down and scratching with their bare hands for potatoes. Riding up and down on horseback was the boss boy.
Schadeberg opened the bonnet of his Austin and pretended to be looking at the engine while taking photographs with his telephoto lens.
He spotted Nxumalo, opened the door of the passenger seat and pressed the “miserable, squeaky” hooter. Nxumalo dropped his basket and came running towards him. Schadeberg put foot on the gas and they started to laugh as the boss boy gave chase cracking his whip like a demented cowboy.
These are but some of the memorable moments in an incredible life. Schadeberg died at the weekend at the age of 89. He left SA a rare glimpse into our past. For that we owe him a profound debt of thanks.
He heard about a magazine called The African Drum. Everybody told him it would be disastrous to work for a publication ‘about natives’