Graeme Williams (born 1961) is a South African photographer[1] known for both his photojournalism during the transition to democracy in South Africa[2] and his documentary projects post-apartheid.
Williams was born in Cape Town in 1961, where he went on to earn his Bachelor of Science in Geology and Statistics at the University of Cape Town.[3] His first job as a photographer was for the Cape Times as a property photographer.[4] After moving to Johannesburg in 1988,[2] he began to work for Reuters in 1989 photographing opposition to apartheid and the transition from apartheid to the African National Congress.[5] In 1991, he began to contribute to Afrapix, a collective of documentary photographers depicting apartheid to be used in newspapers around the world.[5]
Williams worked as a photojournalist until 1994. In a video for the Victoria and Albert Museum, Williams said: "towards the end of ninety-four I had a real strong feeling that I'd never really wanted to be a photojournalistic type photographer or to cover war and violence. I made a very strong stand almost to say, 'OK I'm going to stop that completely,' and I never did that sort of hard photojournalism news again."[6] After South Africa's transition to democracy, Williams focused on magazine features and documentary projects. Many of his photographs concentrate on South African society and documenting the personal lives of individuals.[3]
Williams has had work published in South African and international publications, including: National Geographic, Time, Newsweek, Stern, Sunday Telegraph Magazine, New York Times Magazine, Photography (UK), Marie Claire (UK), The Guardian Weekend Magazine, Leadership (South Africa), Los Angeles Times, Sunday Times (UK), The Evening Standard Magazine (UK), Die Woche (Germany), Die Zeit, Greenpeace, Optima (SA), The Scotsman, The Financial Times (UK), The Baltimore Sun, The Independent, The Australian, and Colors.[5][7]
Williams's work is held in the following permanent public collections:
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