Françoise Huguier : "A l'extrême de l'Afrique"

Durban: the most important port in South Africa, situated in the province of Kwazulu-Natal. Durban and its suburbs today have a population of 8 million. The main ethnic group is made up of Zulus.

Squatter-camps : slums, most of which have neither running water nor electricity. Inhabited by black communities unable to afford housing in the townships. The inhabitants of the squatter-camps originally came in from the surrounding countryside of Kwazulu-Natal looking for work, and have now settled on unused land in Durban and its immediate suburbs.

Hostel : night hostels for single men were created under apartheid to house black workers. Overcrowded since the economic crisis, the people staying in hostels tend to belong to groups with particular regional and political affiliations. Some are Inkata strongholds, while others house ANC supporters.

The photographs presented in this exhibition were taken in 1997 in the hostels and squatter-camps of Durban that are remnants of racial segregation. The pain of apartheid can be seen not only in the people's faces but also in their bodies and inside their homes. A form of insidious tension remains at the very heart of the different communities. By spending time in these places the world seems to have forgotten, Françoise Huguier has made a significant step forward in her work on Africa.

Françoise Huguier's photographs of the Sahel had visually more abstract settings and showed faces that were lit with great subtlety. This time we see pain-ridden portraits and apocalyptic still lifes sculpted from light and shade. The elegance and sensuality of the Sahel photographs here give way to starkly-lit pictures of bodies damaged by suffering.