The University of Johannesburg’s Research Centre, Visual Identities in Art and Design, will host a panel discussion  accompanying the exhibition ‘Developing Characters: Contending Cultures & Creative Commerce in a South African Photography Studio’, curated by Dr Steven Dubin.

The exhibition presents a selection of 80 portraits from an archive of 1, 409 original negatives produced by Kitty’s Studio in Pietermaritzburg between 1972 and 1984. Poor and working-class patrons — African, Indian and coloured — came there to be photographed by Singarum Jeevaruthnam Moodley (1922-1987), a.k.a. Kitty, and members of his family.

To accompany the exhibition, the University of Johannesburg’s Research Centre, Visual Identities in Art and Design, will host a panel discussion at the exhibition venue on Thursday 8 August, 18:00 for 18:30 with a panel of scholars, including Dr Siona O’Connell (Centre for Curating the Archive, University of Cape Town), Prof Raimi Gbadamosi (Wits School of the Arts), Molemo Moiloa (Market Photo Workshop) and Vulindlela Nyoni (Visual Art Department, University of Stellenbosch).

Thursday 8 August, 18:00 – 20:30 

NIROXprojects, Arts on Main, Maboneng Precinct, Johannesburg 

www.niroxarts.com