George Hallett: Home and Exile
Curated by Dr Christine Eyene
23 April – 3 July 2026
Preview: Wednesday 22 April, 5:00 – 8:00pm
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George Hallett: Home and Exile brings together works by Cape Town-born South African photographer George Hallett (1942-2020) who lived in exile in Europe from 1970 to the mid-1990s.
Introduced to literature, music and visual arts by South African authors Richard Rive (1931-1989), James Matthews (1929-2024), and visual artist Peter Clarke (1929-2014), Hallett developed his practice as a self-taught street photographer in Cape Town in the 1960s. His early images depict street scenes in places such as the District Six neighbourhood, Black communities, and cultural figures and moments that were to become a major theme throughout his career. As a South African of mixed heritage, his experience of discrimination during apartheid, and the lack of professional opportunities, led him to exile. He first settled in England in the early 1970s before moving to France and the Netherlands. In Europe, and on visits to the United States and other parts of the world, Hallett photographed both South African exile and Black life with the intention of creating a visual record that restored dignity to a people that was either absent or misrepresented in mainstream media. Doing so, he created an incredible photographic archive of Black resistance and resilience both in the place from which he was exiled, and the places that he called home.
George Hallett: Home and Exile focuses on the first part of his exile, with a selection of photographs taken in England in the 1970s and 1980s, bearing witness to the contribution of South African exiles to British culture and society. The exhibition is articulated around three major themes: visual artists that include portraits of pioneering figures such as Gerard Sekoto, Dumile Feni and UK-based artist Gavin Jantjes; jazz musicians, among whom Chris McGregor, Mongezi Feza, Dudu Pukwana, Johnny Dyani and Louis Moholo from the famous band The Blue Notes (later known as Brotherhood of Breath); and his designs for the book covers of Heinemann’s African Writers Series then led by South African-born British editor James Currey. The series published major African writers including Nobel Prize winner Nadine Gordimer and Booker Prize winner Chinua Achebe. This body of work is an example of how Hallett experimented with the photographic medium, both technically, aesthetically, and through the performative scenes his created.
The exhibition concludes with Hallett’s return to South Africa marked by his series on Nelson Mandela during his campaign for South Africa’s first democratic elections in 1994. These images earned him a World Press Photo Award for People in the News in 1995.
First presented at Clémentine de la Féronnière (Paris) in March 2025 as part of Centre Pompidou’s “Échos Paris noir” programme, this new display, in its expanded version, coincides with the 50th anniversary of the Soweto Uprising of 16 June 1976 that raised global awareness on the injustice of the apartheid regime and brought international condemnation.
The accompanying public programme includes artist and curator talks, music, spoken word and film screenings. It will also provide an opportunity to engage with the history of Liverpool’s anti-apartheid movement in the 1980s and its legacies today.
The exhibition and public programme are supported by Liverpool John Moores University’s Institute of Art and Technology (IAT) and an Enhancing Research Cultures Grant on the theme of ‘Decolonial Research Culture’ .
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BIOGRAPHY
George Hallett (1942-2020)
A Cape Town-born, self-taught photographer, George Hallett began his career in the mid-sixties as a street photographer under the guidance of Jacky Heyns, Cape Town editor of Drum magazine. In 1966, when the apartheid government reclassified District Six – a culturally mixed neighbourhood of Cape Town – as a White Area, the young photographer, encouraged by writer and artist Peter E. Clarke and poet James Matthews, decided to use his camera to document it before the forced removals and its demolition.
District Six is the place where Hallett encountered literature through his English teacher, the author Richard Rive. It is also at Matthews’ that he was exposed to American jazz for the first time, as well as pioneering photographer Roy DeCarava and Harlem Renaissance legend Langston Hughes. The impact of these first cultural experiences is reflected in Hallett’s photographs both in South Africa and during his twenty-four-year exile.
At the end of apartheid, Hallett returned to South Africa to document Nelson Mandela’s first presidential campaign. These images earned him a World Press Photo Award in 1995. He was subsequently appointed official photographer for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 1997 and continued to document the new South Africa in the 2000s.
Hallett has exhibited at Clémentine de la Féronnière, Paris, 2025; Peltz Gallery, London, 2023; Michaelis Galleries, Cape Town, 2022; Bozar, Brussels, 2018; Bamako Encounters: African Biennale of Photography, Bamako, 2017; and EVA International, Ormston House, Limerick, 2016. He was also part of Rise and Fall of Apartheid: Photography and the Bureaucracy of Everyday Life curated by Okwui Enwezor at the International Center of Photography, New York, 2012 that toured to Haus der Kunst, Munich and Padiglione d’Arte Contemporanea, Milan in 2013, and Museum Africa, Johannesburg in 2014-15.
His work is in private and public collections including Iziko – South African Art Gallery; Michaelis School of Fine Art – University of Cape Town; District Six Museum and Bo-Kaap Museum, Cape Town, as well as the Library of Birmingham, UK.
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Public Programme
Wednesday, June 3, 6:30-8pm, British Art History – Forgotten Chapters, with Professor Tamar Garb
Art historian and curator Professor Tamar Garb will discuss the art and life of artist Dumile Feni (1942-1991) who lived in exile in London and New York from 1968 to 1991. The conversation will shed light on the artist’s experience in London in the 70s, building on Garb’s research into material from the Grosvenor Gallery and the seminal Contemporary African Art exhibition at Camden Art Centre in 1970.
Free event, book here.
Tuesday, June 16, 6-8:30pm, Anti-Apartheid Struggle: visual legacies and aesthetics of freedom, with Gavin Jantjes and Gideon Mendel, followed by a screening by Breeze Yoko
Coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the Soweto Uprising that erupted on 16 June 1976, this event will consist of a two-part conversation on visual activism and liberation from the burden of sociopolitical imagery. With exhibition curator Dr Christine Eyene, South African artist Gavin Jantjes, and photographer Gideon Mendel. Followed by the screening of Biko’s Children (2008) by artist Breeze Yoko.
Free event, book here.
Tuesday, June 23, 12-1pm, Curator’s Tour with Dr Christine Eyene
Visit the exhibition George Hallett: Home and Exile at ERL Gallery with Dr Christine Eyene who will share stories about South African exile in Britain through the work of George Hallett and the artists featured in his images. This event is a unique opportunity to learn more about Hallett’s practice, the history of the artists, writers, and activists he photographed, and the George Hallett Research Collection developed by Eyene over twenty years in dialogue with Hallett, and in the framework of the project Making Histories Visible with artist Lubaina Himid CBE RA between 2014 and 2022.
Free event, book here.
Thursday, July 2, 5-8pm, Word . Sound . Image, with Eugene Skeef and Imruh Bakari
A multidisciplinary take on George Hallett’s work, at the intersection of literature, music, and photography. The evening will include performance and music with poet and percussionist Eugene Skeef, also featured in George Hallett’s images, and a screening of Blue Notes and Exiled Voices (1992) by Imruh Bakari, filmmaker and co-director of the June Givanni PanAfrican Cinema Archive.
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Exhibition Research Lab
John Lennon Art and Design Building
Duckinfield Street
Liverpool L3 5RD
www.exhibition-research-lab.co.uk
For more information or press images, contact: info@exhibition-research-lab.co.uk
Opening times:
Monday – Wednesday, 11:00am – 5:00pm
Thursday, 12:00 – 5:00pm
Friday, by appointment
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*Please note, our events and projects are always open to all. However, our Quiet Launch is for visitors of all ages who require reduced volume and reduced numbers of other visitors compared to our Public Launch. As such, we may stagger entry for visitors to ensure the gallery doesn’t become too crowded at any given time.
If you have any other access requirements, then please contact us and we will do our best to facilitate them.
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Photo: George Hallett, Exile, London, 1983. Courtesy of George Hallett Research Collection. © George Hallett Estate.