The Most Famous
PHOTOGRAPHERS from South Africa
This page contains a list of the greatest South African Photographers. The pantheon dataset contains 148 Photographers, 1 of which were born in South Africa. This makes South Africa the birth place of the 30th most number of Photographers behind Australia, and Portugal.
Top 1
The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the most legendary South African Photographers of all time. This list of famous South African Photographers is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity.
1. Zanele Muholi (b. 1972)
With an HPI of 46.33, Zanele Muholi is the most famous South African Photographer. Her biography has been translated into 18 different languages on wikipedia.
Zanele Muholi (born 19 July 1972) is a South African artist and visual activist working in photography, video, and installation. Muholi's work focuses on race, gender and sexuality with a body of work that dates back to the early 2000s, documenting and celebrating the lives of South Africa's Black Lesbian, Gay, transgender, and intersex communities. Muholi is non-binary and uses they/them pronouns, explaining that "I'm just human". Muholi was shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize in 2015. They received an Infinity Award from the International Center of Photography in 2016, a Chevalier de Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2016, and an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Photographic Society in 2018. Muholi had a retrospective exhibition on at Maison européenne de la photographie in Paris from 1 February to 25 May 2023. Their work was also shown that year at Mudec-Museo delle Culture in Milan, from 31 March through 30 July 2023, showcasing 60 self-portraits in black and white chosen especially for Mudec.
People
Pantheon has 1 people classified as South African photographers born between 1972 and 1972. Of these 1, 1 (100.00%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living South African photographers include Zanele Muholi.