Separate But Equal: Apartheid

Howardena Pindell created Separate But Equal in protest of apartheid—South Africa’s rigid, racially segregated caste system created by the country’s white citizens. It established and maintained wealth and privilege while depriving the black majority of their civil, economic, and political rights. The system’s implications are revealed through the use of color, words, and found objects. In the white section, Pindell incorporates words such as Barbaric, Parasitic, and Profit; in the middle section, terms include Endless Labor, Pass Book, and 0 Votes; the lower , ripped from and tenuously reconnected to the rest of the canvas, contains the words Malnutrition, Death, and Torture. Each section, combined with the rhinestones, nails, and painted gold frame, deftly reveals the tension, danger, and violence prevalent during this dark era.

A mixed media artwork referencing apartheid in South Africa. The work features a black and white canvas studded with rhinestones; a white strip forms a horizontal plane atop a black field. The canvas has been ripped and then sewn together, leaving a diagonal gash along the right side of the work. Words have been superimposed on the black field using black vinyl tape: Apartheid, Camps, The Mines, Disappearances, Pass Book, Endless Labor, 0 Votes, Detention, Interrogation, SOWETO. Words have been added to the white part of the canvas using white vinyl tape: Indifference, Separate State, Cruel, Profit, The Bomb, Barbaric, Killers, Comfort, Parasitic, Apartheid. There is a wooden frame around the plaster with nails protruding out from it.