George Hallett Collection

This collection contains a selection of work by, or involving, George Hallett, photographer, including:
1. 52 exhibition prints and 50 work prints from the 'Handsworth Through Southern Eyes' exhibition shown at Soho House, Birmingham during 2002.
2. Exhibition prints, work prints and material supporting the photographs and the 'Bearing Witness' exhibition, Coventry. This exhibition was about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa. It was shown at the Herbert Museum and Art Gallery, September 2004.

Acc. 2010/116
Draft
1 box containing contact prints & 3 boxes containing black & white photographic prints, originally loaned to Photographic Projects Team [c. 2005] for potential project which was ultimately unrealized.
1 box containing press cuttings & 7 large format black & white photographic prints & 1 box with photographic slides.
Contents re-boxed as follows:

Box 1
'George Hallett Photography'
Box labelled with notepaper headed as per title. Containing b/w contact prints [109 prints size: 10 x 8ins; 1 print size: 10 x 6.3ins; & 1 print size: 10 x 4ins]
Box 2
'George Hallett, Exiles, African Writers', 'George Hallett, Exiles 1970s Work prints'
Box labelled top & side as per title, containing approx. 91 b/w work prints size 10 x 8ins or smaller. All prints have hand-written captions under image, some also have stickers and/or inscriptions verso. Most images relate to those in the contact print sheets in box 1. Post-it note attached to 22nd print gives name 'Lesedi Mogoatlhe' & telephone number. Post-it attached to 25th print reads: 'Truth & Reconciliation, 1974' The date is crossed out. Also found between prints 36 & 37: handwritten letter dated 10th Jan 2005, to 'Pete' from 'Bra George'.
Box 3 [ON LOAN TO GEORGE HALLETT 09/07/2011 See d/file]
'George Hallett, The English, Box II'
Box labelled as per title & containing approx. 91 b/w photographic prints [size 10 x 8ins approx.]; 1 b/w photographic print size 8.5 x 6.5ins approx.; & 4 b/w contact prints sheets. All prints are captioned under image & many are dated 1972 & 1973. Most images relate to those in the contact print sheets in box 1
Box 4
'George Hallett The English 1972-1979' Box 2 of 2 139 prints'
Box labelled as per title & containing handwritten letter dated Friday 25.2.2005 + approx. 96 b/w photographic prints [size 10 x 8ins approx.] All prints have hand-written captions under image. 88th print is duplicate of the 25th print in Box 2. Dates from 1970s
Box 5
'George Hallett 1970s Press Cuttings'
Box labelled as per title & containing:
/ b/w photographic print [16 x 12ins] showing close-up of hand holding bells.
/ 'Aimless days and sleepless nights' - double-page spread captioned as per title & taken from 'The Times Educational Supplement' 8.10.71. Mounted on card & folded, the outside has cuttings from newspapers & magazines inc. 'Drugs & Society'.
/ 29 whole sheets and/or cuttings mostly from 'The Times Educational supplement', 1970s.
/ 'Public Lectures in English, Janvier 1993' - 2x poster from the 'British Institute in Paris' as per title, includes details of lecture 'South African Series (4) South Africa: The turbulent Eighties' by George Hallett
/ 6 b/w photographic prints [16 x 12ins] 3 [1 duplicate print] show musicians.
Box 6 [ON LOAN TO GEORGE HALLETT 09/07/2011 See d/file]
'George Hallett - Handsworth Through Southern Eyes - Vanley - Veterans Slides'
Box labelled as per title & containing 7 slide holders holding total of approx. 184 b/w photographic slides

One envelope of photographic prints relating the the 'Brotherhood of Breath' group - by George Hallett

No copying is allowed without the photographer's express permission.

George Hallett was born in Cape Town, South Africa in 1942. His early inspiration to become a photographer came from the movies he saw at the Friday night film show at the primary school in the fishing village of Hout Bay. On the way home, as friends enacted scenes from the films, Hallett would be thinking about the camera angles, composition and dramatic lighting that impressed him in the films.

At the age of 20 he began a correspondence course in photography with the London City and Guilds. He started freelancing for the famous South African magazine Drum in 1964, but the politics of segregation made it virtually impossible to find other work. Hallett therefore decided to leave for London. Before his departure, the author James Matthews persuaded him to photograph District Six: an area in Cape Town about to be bulldozed to the ground. Hallett subsequently donated the work to the District Six Museum.

Hallett moved to London in 1970 where he made contact with South African exiles like Alex la Guma, Pallo Jordan, and Dudu Pukwana. He free-lanced for The Times Newspapers and designed book covers for Heinemann Educational Books for over 12 years. During this period he had his first exhibition in Amsterdam under the auspices of the World Council of Churches.

In 1974 he moved to France where he worked in small scale farming, while photographing the local people, and regularly went abroad to teach and exhibit. Shortly after the independence of Zimbabwe, he worked there for a short time with Hugh Lewin at the Institute for Mass Communications in Harare, leaving for Amsterdam to teach photography to Moroccan and Turkish youths, and was there commissioned for various projects by the Anne Frank Foundation.

His work has been exhibited at the Schomburg Centre for Research in Black Culture, New York; Sonja Henie Nils Onstad Museum, Norway; Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin; Wetekerk, Amsterdam; Presence Africaine, Paris; University of Lund, Sweden; Atelier Six in Ceret, France; Frankfurter Buchmesse, Germany; Howard University Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.; The Irma Stern Museum, Cape Town; Birmingham Central Library; and Soho House Museum, Birmingham; and many others more in America, Norway, Germany, Amsterdam, Paris, Sweden and his native South Africa. Hallett has also taught at various institutions in most of these countries, as well as contributing to, and completing various photographic commissions, films and books.

He began working back in South Africa in 1990 and in 1994 was commissioned by the ANC to photograph the movement's coming to power; a series of photographs of Nelson Mandela taken during the elections that year. This won him a Golden Eye Award from the World Press Photo in Amsterdam. Hallett returned to resettle in Cape Town, South Africa in 1995.

He was also awarded, in 1980, for Outstanding Contributions to Photography, by Hasselblad Cameras, in Sweden. As well as in 1999 winning the Picture Story category in the Cape Times / One City Many Cultures Awards.