Let us not forget...

I recently completed a project on photographing a subculture. And yes the so to say subculture I chose some might consider very incorporated into our daily lives that people see them as part of society and not as a sub part like the word subculture might imply. Where I live little shops exist that are usually run by older ladies who sell home baked goods, pickled little things and pancakes to go. They tend to be taken for granted but are vanishing as we speak because lager corporations such as supermarkets also tend to sell these "home made" goods today and because of the tricky little word "convenience" the average consumer tends to not go the extra mile (mile here refers to a distance of about 10 meters within the same centre) to buy real honest produce from a tuisnywerheid. This is sad. By choosing these ladies, or rather tannies, as my subjects I want to create awareness of the issues and problems these little shops are facing in today's mass consumer orientated society that slowly but surely takes away the chance these micro industries have on the market.

Here an image I took that is part of a 5 piece series about tuisnywerheid ladies in Pretoria.

The experience of talking to these ladies and their passion for what they do is absolutely wonderful. Some of them told me they specifically support older ladies who lost their husband in order for them to make a little extra money on the side. They talked about big supermarkets as their competition and how so many shops have vanished over the past years. But one thing I noticed in all the shops I visited... there is so much pride, pride of true home baked cakes and little tarts, of jams and pickles, of savory pies and traditional vetkoek and the personal relationships between the shop owners and the baking tannies. Just this I find makes it so important to not forget about them but to appreciate community driven little shops somewhere in the corner of a huge shopping centre who believe in real food, rather than mass produced... crap.