ILVY NJIOKIKTJIEN
BORN FREE - Mandela's Generation of Hope

Post-apartheid life - the young people of South Africa.
In 1994 South Africa held its first inclusive elections. These brought an end to decades of white minority rule. A new constitution gave all South Africans equal rights. As the nation’s first black president, Nelson Mandela focused on reconciliation and hope for the future.
The children born in the years right after apartheid ended are now young adults: the born-free generation for whom racial segregation is a thing of the past. It falls to these young South Africans to make Mandela’s dream of a rainbow nation come true.
My personal project, ranging over 12 years, takes a look into how free the born-frees really are and how modern day racism influences their day-to-day lives. The born free stories are about social change, freedom, humanity, (in)equality and diversity, about all walks of the Mandela generation: rich and poor, black, white, Indian and coloured, city and rural, of different faiths and social and cultural groups.

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