61-587: Steve Bloom (born 1953) is a South African photographer and writer. Son of journalist, novelist, and political activist Harry Bloom , he is best known for his photography books and essays as well as his large scale outdoor exhibitions called Spirit of the Wild . Bloom was born in Johannesburg, South Africa. Bloom's early interest in photography was inspired by the pictures in Life magazine. In 1972 he trained as
122-813: A gravure printer, and took portraits of people living under the Apartheid system. In 1977 he travelled to England where some of the pictures were published and exhibited internationally by The International Defence and Aid Fund. For several years he worked in graphic arts, and in 1999 was jointly responsible for the implementation of the Addison designs for the official posters for the summer Olympic Games in Barcelona, 1992. Bloom began to photograph wildlife in 1993 while on vacation in South Africa. In 1996 he devoted all his time to wildlife photography and spent
183-538: A ban on professional employment, the refusal of higher education for the dissidents' children, police harassment and prison. During the 1980s, Czechoslovakia became one of the most tightly controlled Communist regimes in the Warsaw Pact in resistance to the mitigation of controls notified by Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev . In 1989, the Velvet Revolution restored democracy. This occurred around
244-627: A chance for many of their compatriots to participate in communal life before independence. Palacký supported Austro-Slavism and worked for a reorganized federal Austrian Empire , which would protect the Slavic speaking peoples of Central Europe against Russian and German threats. An advocate of democratic reform and Czech autonomy within Austria-Hungary, Masaryk was elected twice to the Reichsrat (Austrian Parliament), from 1891 to 1893 for
305-830: A journalist and writer, and they married in Canterbury , Kent, in 1967. Sonia had two children fathered from an affair with Harry Bloom’s student, Colin Stone – Samantha Bloom (born 1975) and actor Orlando Bloom (born January 1977), who until age 13 believed Harry Bloom was their biological father. Bloom suffered a stroke in 1976. After a period of declining health, he died in a Canterbury hospital in 1981. Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( / ˌ tʃ ɛ k oʊ s l oʊ ˈ v æ k i . ə , ˈ tʃ ɛ k ə -, - s l ə -, - ˈ v ɑː -/ CHEK -oh-sloh- VAK -ee-ə, CHEK -ə-, -slə-, - VAH - ; Czech and Slovak : Československo , Česko-Slovensko )
366-467: A major factor in the 1980s. Slightly after the foundation of Czechoslovakia in 1918, there was a lack of essential infrastructure in many areas – paved roads , railways , bridges , etc. Massive improvement in the following years enabled Czechoslovakia to develop its industry. Prague 's civil airport in Ruzyně became one of the most modern terminals in the world when it was finished in 1937. Tomáš Baťa ,
427-589: A musical. Episode was republished in 1981. In 1963, Bloom left South Africa for Kenya, mainly due to his opposition to apartheid, and then moved to England. According to The Times , he came to England "in search of a new life, mainly as an academic and a journalist." His wife and children stayed behind in South Africa. In 1967, Bloom was appointed Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Kent . With founding law professor Patrick Fitzgerald, he helped to set up
488-511: A political monopoly was held by the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ). The leader of the KSČ was de facto the most powerful person in the country during this period. Gustáv Husák was elected first secretary of the KSČ in 1969 (changed to general secretary in 1971) and president of Czechoslovakia in 1975. Other parties and organizations existed but functioned in subordinate roles to
549-648: A threat to German rule. Just like Jews, Poles, Serbs, and several other nations, Czechs were considered to be untermenschen by the Nazi state. In 1940, in a secret Nazi plan for the Germanization of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia it was declared that those considered to be of racially Mongoloid origin and the Czech intelligentsia were not to be Germanized. The deportation of Jews to concentration camps
610-777: A unified Czechoslovakia was restored after World War II (after the country had been divided during the war), the conflict between the Czechs and the Slovaks surfaced again. The governments of Czechoslovakia and other Central European nations deported ethnic Germans, reducing the presence of minorities in the nation. Most of the Jews had been killed during the war by the Nazis. Ethnicities of Czechoslovakia in 1921 Ethnicities of Czechoslovakia in 1930 *Jews identified themselves as Germans or Hungarians (and Jews only by religion not ethnicity),
671-662: Is a body of photographs covering several African countries, mixing photographs of wildlife , remote tribal groups ,and people in cities, including gold miners 3 km underground. Bloom's second book on Africa, Trading Places – The Merchants of Nairobi , features subsistence shopkeepers in the suburbs of Nairobi , including Kibera . He has also published several children's books including My Big Cats Journal (Thames & Hudson), My Favourite Animal Families (Thames & Hudson) and Les animaux racontés aux enfants (Editions de la Martinière Jeunesse). By 2010, Bloom had produced eleven city centre outdoor exhibitions called Spirit of
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#1732775620689732-728: The Danube River basin. The weather is mild winters and mild summers. Influenced by the Atlantic Ocean from the west, the Baltic Sea from the north, and Mediterranean Sea from the south. There is no continental weather. The area was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until it collapsed at the end of World War I . The new state was founded by Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk , who served as its first president from 14 November 1918 to 14 December 1935. He
793-664: The NSDAP in the December 1938 elections. Almost every decree explicitly stated that the sanctions did not apply to antifascists. Some 250,000 Germans, many married to Czechs, some antifascists, and also those required for the post-war reconstruction of the country, remained in Czechoslovakia. The Beneš Decrees still cause controversy among nationalist groups in the Czech Republic, Germany, Austria and Hungary. Following
854-711: The Sudetenland . On 29 September 1938, Britain and France ceded control in the Appeasement at the Munich Conference ; France ignored the military alliance it had with Czechoslovakia. During October 1938, Nazi Germany occupied the Sudetenland border region, effectively crippling Czechoslovak defences. The First Vienna Award assigned a strip of southern Slovakia and Carpathian Ruthenia to Hungary. Poland occupied Zaolzie, an area whose population
915-597: The Warsaw Pact of 1955. A period of political liberalization in 1968, the Prague Spring , ended when the Soviet Union, assisted by other Warsaw Pact countries, invaded Czechoslovakia . In 1989, as Marxist–Leninist governments and communism were ending all over Central and Eastern Europe , Czechoslovaks peacefully deposed their communist government during the Velvet Revolution , which began on 17 November 1989 and ended 11 days later on 28 November when all of
976-599: The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), one of the specialized agencies of the United Nations , which was created in 1967 "to encourage creative activity and to promote the protection of intellectual property throughout the world." Many of the components of his work, and the articles he wrote, had a significant impact in the early days of the transition from the offline into the online world. He has been remembered "as
1037-790: The Young Czech Party , and from 1907 to 1914 for the Czech Realist Party , which he had founded in 1889 with Karel Kramář and Josef Kaizl . During World War I a number of Czechs and Slovaks, the Czechoslovak Legions , fought with the Allies in France and Italy, while large numbers deserted to Russia in exchange for its support for the independence of Czechoslovakia from the Austrian Empire. With
1098-680: The autonomous regions of Slovakia and Subcarpathian Ruthenia. Annexed by Hungary (1939–1945). ČSR; declared a "people's democracy" (without a formal name change) under the Ninth-of-May Constitution following the 1948 coup . ČSSR; from 1969, after the Prague Spring , consisted of the Czech Socialist Republic (ČSR) and Slovak Socialist Republic (SSR). Oblast of the Ukrainian SSR . Oblast of Ukraine . After World War II,
1159-911: The 1946 parliamentary election, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia was the winner in the Czech lands , and the Democratic Party won in Slovakia. In February 1948 the Communists seized power . Although they would maintain the fiction of political pluralism through the existence of the National Front , except for a short period in the late 1960s (the Prague Spring ) the country had no liberal democracy . Since citizens lacked significant electoral methods of registering protest against government policies, periodically there were street protests that became violent. For example, there were riots in
1220-745: The Blitz . Writing under the pseudonyms Walter and Beryl Storm (to avoid anti-Semitism), they worked as war correspondents during the Second World War , and covered the Nuremberg trials after the war. The couple moved to Czechoslovakia and together they wrote the book We meet the Czechoslovaks , an account of their early years in Czechoslovakia, also under the Storm pseudonyms. Beryl later played an active role in editing, advising and typing
1281-607: The Czech intelligentsia; the intellectual elites and middle class made up a considerable number of the 200,000 people who passed through concentration camps and the 250,000 who died during German occupation. Under Generalplan Ost , it was assumed that around 50% of Czechs would be fit for Germanization . The Czech intellectual elites were to be removed not only from Czech territories but from Europe completely. The authors of Generalplan Ost believed it would be best if they emigrated overseas, as even in Siberia they were considered
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#17327756206891342-629: The Czechs of the Protectorate Bohemia and Moravia, German occupation was a period of brutal oppression. Czech losses resulting from political persecution and deaths in concentration camps totaled between 36,000 and 55,000. The Jewish populations of Bohemia and Moravia (118,000 according to the 1930 census) were virtually annihilated. Many Jews emigrated after 1939; more than 70,000 were killed; 8,000 survived at Terezín. Several thousand Jews managed to live in freedom or in hiding throughout
1403-536: The German war effort was accelerated. Under the authority of Karl Hermann Frank , German minister of state for Bohemia and Moravia, some 350,000 Czech laborers were dispatched to the Reich. Within the protectorate, all non-war-related industry was prohibited. Most of the Czech population obeyed quiescently up until the final months preceding the end of the war, while thousands were involved in the resistance movement . For
1464-647: The Gulf War with a small force of 200 troops under the command of the U.S.-led coalition. In 1992, because of growing nationalist tensions in the government, Czechoslovakia was peacefully dissolved by parliament. On 31 December 1992, it formally separated into two independent countries, the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic . ČSR; boundaries and government established by the 1920 constitution . Annexed by Nazi Germany . ČSR; included
1525-817: The KSČ. All political parties, as well as numerous mass organizations, were grouped under umbrella of the National Front . Human rights activists and religious activists were severely repressed. Czechoslovakia had the following constitutions during its history (1918–1992): In the 1930s, the nation formed a military alliance with France, which collapsed in the Munich Agreement of 1938. After World War II , an active participant in Council for Mutual Economic Assistance ( Comecon ), Warsaw Pact , United Nations and its specialized agencies; signatory of conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe . Before World War II,
1586-604: The Slovaks, who were hostile to the more numerous Czechs, weakened the country in the late 1930s. Slovakia became autonomous in the fall of 1938, and by mid-1939, Slovakia had become independent, with the First Slovak Republic set up as a satellite state of Nazi Germany and the far-right Slovak People's Party in power . After 1933, Czechoslovakia remained the only democracy in central and eastern Europe. In September 1938, Adolf Hitler demanded control of
1647-502: The Soviet Union, gradually put the brakes on their earlier liberal policies. Meanwhile, one plank of the reform program had been carried out: in 1968–69, Czechoslovakia was turned into a federation of the Czech Socialist Republic and Slovak Socialist Republic . The theory was that under the federation, social and economic inequities between the Czech and Slovak halves of the state would be largely eliminated. A number of ministries, such as education, now became two formally equal bodies in
1708-708: The Wild , each consisting of up to 100 large format weather-sealed prints. Free and usually open to the public 24 hours a day, the theme of the exhibitions was to engender awareness of habitat encroachment and global warming. The inaugural exhibition, in Birmingham , England, ran for eleven months in Centenary Square . Further exhibitions followed in Copenhagen, Leeds, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Moscow, Dublin, Oslo, Stavanger, Barcelona, Edinburgh, Tokyo ,and Abbeville. The Copenhagen exhibition opened on 16 May 2006 and
1769-503: The economy was about the fourth in all industrial countries in Europe. The state was based on strong economy, manufacturing cars ( Škoda , Tatra ), trams, aircraft ( Aero , Avia ), ships, ship engines ( Škoda ), cannons, shoes ( Baťa ), turbines, guns ( Zbrojovka Brno ). It was the industrial workshop for the Austro-Hungarian empire. The Slovak lands relied more heavily on agriculture than the Czech lands. After World War II,
1830-484: The economy was centrally planned, with command links controlled by the communist party, similarly to the Soviet Union . The large metallurgical industry was dependent on imports of iron and non-ferrous ores. After World War II, the country was short of energy, relying on imported crude oil and natural gas from the Soviet Union, domestic brown coal , and nuclear and hydroelectric energy . Energy constraints were
1891-553: The expulsion of the ethnic German population from Czechoslovakia, parts of the former Sudetenland , especially around Krnov and the surrounding villages of the Jesenik mountain region in northeastern Czechoslovakia, were settled in 1949 by Communist refugees from Northern Greece who had left their homeland as a result of the Greek Civil War . These Greeks made up a large proportion of the town and region's population until
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1952-560: The first Law Department at the University which was rooted in an interdisciplinary ethos. Bloom went on to collaborate with Igor Aleksander , now Emeritus Professor at Imperial College London , on the societal impact of computer networks and then worked for a newly set up Unit for Legal Research in Computer and Communications, which considered the legal protection of computer software and retrieval of statutes. This involved meetings with
2013-429: The following two years working on his first book, In Praise of Primates , which was published in ten languages. In 2004 Untamed , an oversize book that features animals from all the world's continents, was published in ten language editions for its first printing, and in 2006 he published two monographs: Elephant! and Spirit of the Wild . In 2006 he returned to photographing people. Living Africa , published in 2008,
2074-693: The founder of the teaching of the law affecting the media in the UK." After the war, Bloom and wife Beryl returned to Durban, South Africa , where their first child, Peter, was born in 1944, but he died aged six weeks. In October 1948, their daughter Susan Storm-Bloom, a photographer and jewellery designer, was born in Prague . Their son Stephen Jack Bloom , a photographer and author, was born in Johannesburg in 1953. Harry and Beryl divorced shortly after Bloom moved to London in 1963. There he met Sonia Copeland,
2135-589: The late 1980s/early 1990s. Although defined as "Greeks", the Greek Communist community of Krnov and the Jeseniky region actually consisted of an ethnically diverse population, including Greek Macedonians , Macedonians , Vlachs , Pontic Greeks and Turkish speaking Urums or Caucasus Greeks . Carpathian Ruthenia (Podkarpatská Rus) was occupied by (and in June 1945 formally ceded to) the Soviet Union. In
2196-527: The manuscripts for his subsequent books. Fearful for their security as Stalinism gained strength in post-war Eastern Europe, they returned to South Africa , and settled in Bramley , Johannesburg. In 1957, a few months after Bloom's first novel, Episode in the Transvaal , was published, the family moved to Cape Town . Episode , a novel, was published in 1956; it was later retitled Transvaal Episode . It
2257-547: The most industrialized regions of the former Austria-Hungary. The new country was a multi-ethnic state, with Czechs and Slovaks as constituent peoples . The population consisted of Czechs (51%), Slovaks (16%), Germans (22%), Hungarians (5%) and Rusyns (4%). Many of the Germans, Hungarians, Ruthenians and Poles and some Slovaks, felt oppressed because the political elite did not generally allow political autonomy for minority ethnic groups. This policy led to unrest among
2318-564: The non-Czech population, particularly in German-speaking Sudetenland , which initially had proclaimed itself part of the Republic of German-Austria in accordance with the self-determination principle. The state proclaimed the official ideology that there were no separate Czech and Slovak nations, but only one nation of Czechoslovaks (see Czechoslovakism ), to the disagreement of Slovaks and other ethnic groups. Once
2379-497: The occupation. Despite the estimated 136,000 deaths at the hands of the Nazi regime, the population in the Reichsprotektorate saw a net increase during the war years of approximately 250,000 in line with an increased birth rate. On 6 May 1945, the third US Army of General Patton entered Plzeň from the south west. On 9 May 1945, Soviet Red Army troops entered Prague . After World War II, pre-war Czechoslovakia
2440-459: The occupations. In 1948, this provision was cancelled for the Hungarians, but only partially for the Germans. The government then confiscated the property of the Germans and expelled about 90% of the ethnic German population , over 2 million people. Those who remained were collectively accused of supporting the Nazis after the Munich Agreement , as 97.32% of Sudeten Germans had voted for
2501-408: The outbreak of World War I, Masaryk began working for Czech independence in a union with Slovakia. With Edvard Beneš and Milan Rastislav Štefánik , Masaryk visited several Western countries and won support from influential publicists. The Czechoslovak National Council was the main organization that advanced the claims for a Czechoslovak state. The Bohemian Kingdom ceased to exist in 1918 when it
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2562-663: The preservation of the Soviet, socialist system and vowed to intervene in any state that sought to replace Marxism-Leninism with capitalism . In the week after the invasion, there was a spontaneous campaign of civil resistance against the occupation. This resistance involved a wide range of acts of non-cooperation and defiance: this was followed by a period in which the Czechoslovak Communist Party leadership, having been forced in Moscow to make concessions to
2623-434: The prime architect of the Czechoslovak-Romanian-Yugoslav alliance (the " Little Entente ", 1921–38) directed against Hungarian attempts to reclaim lost areas. Beneš worked closely with France. Far more dangerous was the German element, which after 1933 became allied with the Nazis in Germany. Czech-Slovak relations came to be a central issue in Czechoslovak politics during the 1930s. The increasing feeling of inferiority among
2684-501: The reformer Alexander Dubček was appointed to the key post of First Secretary of the Czechoslovak Communist Party, there was a brief period of liberalization known as the Prague Spring . In response, after failing to persuade the Czechoslovak leaders to change course, five other members of the Warsaw Pact invaded . Soviet tanks rolled into Czechoslovakia on the night of 20–21 August 1968. Soviet Communist Party General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev viewed this intervention as vital for
2745-417: The same time as the fall of communism in Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, East Germany and Poland. The word "socialist" was removed from the country's full name on 29 March 1990 and replaced by "federal". Pope John Paul II made a papal visit to Czechoslovakia on 21 April 1990, hailing it as a symbolic step of reviving Christianity in the newly-formed post-communist state. Czechoslovakia participated in
2806-432: The state ceased to exist, as Slovakia proclaimed its independence and Carpathian Ruthenia became part of Hungary , while the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was proclaimed in the remainder of the Czech Lands . In 1939, after the outbreak of World War II , former Czechoslovak President Edvard Beneš formed a government-in-exile and sought recognition from the Allies . After World War II, Czechoslovakia
2867-504: The sum is, therefore, more than 100%. During the period between the two world wars Czechoslovakia was a democratic state. The population was generally literate, and contained fewer alienated groups. The influence of these conditions was augmented by the political values of Czechoslovakia's leaders and the policies they adopted. Under Tomas Masaryk , Czech and Slovak politicians promoted progressive social and economic conditions that served to defuse discontent. Foreign minister Beneš became
2928-404: The top Communist leaders and Communist party itself resigned. On 31 December 1992, Czechoslovakia peacefully split into the two sovereign states of the Czech Republic and Slovakia . The country was of generally irregular terrain. The western area was part of the north-central European uplands. The eastern region was composed of the northern reaches of the Carpathian Mountains and lands of
2989-417: The town of Plzeň in 1953 , reflecting economic discontent. Police and army units put down the rebellion, and hundreds were injured but no one was killed. While its economy remained more advanced than those of its neighbors in Eastern Europe, Czechoslovakia grew increasingly economically weak relative to Western Europe. The currency reform of 1953 caused dissatisfaction among Czechoslovak laborers. To equalize
3050-445: The two formally equal republics. However, the centralized political control by the Czechoslovak Communist Party severely limited the effects of federalization. The 1970s saw the rise of the dissident movement in Czechoslovakia, represented among others by Václav Havel . The movement sought greater political participation and expression in the face of official disapproval, manifested in limitations on work activities, which went as far as
3111-410: The wage rate, Czechoslovaks had to turn in their old money for new at a decreased value. The banks also confiscated savings and bank deposits to control the amount of money in circulation. In the 1950s, Czechoslovakia experienced high economic growth (averaging 7% per year), which allowed for a substantial increase in wages and living standards, thus promoting the stability of the regime. In 1968, when
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#17327756206893172-457: Was a landlocked country in Central Europe , created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary . In 1938, after the Munich Agreement , the Sudetenland became part of Nazi Germany , while the country lost further territories to Hungary and Poland (the territories of southern Slovakia with a predominantly Hungarian population to Hungary and Zaolzie with a predominantly Polish population to Poland). Between 1939 and 1945,
3233-626: Was dedicated to four people: his wife Beryl, who provided editorial assistance and typed the manuscript; Bram Fischer , Bloom's close friend who defended Nelson Mandela at the Rivonia Trial ; Archbishop Trevor Huddleston , and Guy Routh. Bloom worked with Nelson Mandela in Johannesburg in the 1950s. During the state of emergency that followed the Sharpeville massacre in 1960, he was detained for 45 days without charges or trial, first at Roeland Street Prison and later at Worcester Prison near Cape Town. He worked on Whittaker's Wife (1962) during this time. King Kong: An African Jazz Opera (1961) became
3294-606: Was hosted by Leicester Museum and Art Gallery from 4 February to 10 May 2023. Harry Bloom Harry Saul Bloom (born Solomon Harris Bloom ; 1 January 1913 – 28 July 1981) was a South African journalist, novelist, activist and lecturer. Solomon Harris Bloom was born into a Jewish South African family. He was educated at the University of the Witwatersrand , obtaining his law degree in 1937. He subsequently became an advocate in Johannesburg . In 1940, he married Beryl Cynthia Gordon, after knowing her three weeks, and they moved to London , living in Old Compton Street during
3355-464: Was incorporated into Czechoslovakia. Czechoslovakia was founded in October 1918, as one of the successor states of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the end of World War I and as part of the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye . It consisted of the present day territories of Bohemia , Moravia , parts of Silesia making up present day Czech Republic , Slovakia , and a region of present-day Ukraine called Carpathian Ruthenia . Its territory included some of
3416-483: Was majority Polish, in October 1938. On 14 March 1939, the remainder ("rump") of Czechoslovakia was dismembered by the proclamation of the Slovak State , the next day the rest of Carpathian Ruthenia was occupied and annexed by Hungary, while the following day the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was proclaimed. The eventual goal of the German state under Nazi leadership was to eradicate Czech nationality through assimilation, deportation, and extermination of
3477-404: Was organized under the direction of Reinhard Heydrich , and the fortress town of Terezín was made into a ghetto way station for Jewish families. On 4 June 1942 Heydrich died after being wounded by an assassin in Operation Anthropoid . Heydrich's successor, Colonel General Kurt Daluege , ordered mass arrests and executions and the destruction of the villages of Lidice and Ležáky . In 1943
3538-410: Was reestablished under its pre-1938 borders, with the exception of Carpathian Ruthenia, which became part of the Ukrainian SSR (a republic of the Soviet Union ). The Communist Party seized power in a coup in 1948 . From 1948 to 1989, Czechoslovakia was part of the Eastern Bloc with a planned economy . Its economic status was formalized in membership of Comecon from 1949 and its defense status in
3599-437: Was reestablished, with the exception of Sub carpathian Ruthenia , which was annexed by the Soviet Union and incorporated into the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic . The Beneš decrees were promulgated concerning ethnic Germans (see Potsdam Agreement ) and ethnic Hungarians. Under the decrees, citizenship was abrogated for people of German and Hungarian ethnic origin who had accepted German or Hungarian citizenship during
3660-554: Was succeeded by his close ally Edvard Beneš (1884–1948). The roots of Czech nationalism go back to the 19th century, when philologists and educators, influenced by Romanticism , promoted the Czech language and pride in the Czech people . Nationalism became a mass movement in the second half of the 19th century. Taking advantage of the limited opportunities for participation in political life under Austrian rule, Czech leaders such as historian František Palacký (1798–1876) founded various patriotic, self-help organizations which provided
3721-516: Was visited by 1,019,028 people during the first three months. In June 2012, the London Festival of Photography featured his exhibition, Beneath the Surface: South Africa in the 1970s at The Guardian ' s gallery in London. The exhibition showed his early work in apartheid South Africa, portraying a critical time in the country's history when widescale protests against apartheid took hold. The exhibition ran at Canterbury Museum's Beaney Special Exhibitions Gallery from 19 October and 19 January 2020. It
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