Tracey Rose
KKK Supreme (2009)
KKK Supreme seeks to address issues of race, post-colonial heritage, the slave trade, modern media depictions of African Americans and African – particularly South African – political and social dynamics. The image was inspired by the text KKK by D.E. Fault, by Reikanne Mofokeng, influenced by the novel Blackheart by South African writer Lesego Rampolokeng – aka Bavino Bachana. Rampolokeng, who came to prominence in the 1980s, is a crucial literary figure in South Africa and was strongly influenced by the Black Consciousness movements of the 1970s and 80s and the work of Frantz Fanon. The haunting, bitterly sardonic beauty of Mofokeng’s text was the driving force for Rose’s construction of the image. Photographed at Freedom Square in Kliptown, Johannesburg, the image is a character extraction shot for KniggerKhaffirKhoon aka ‘KKK’ for X-Homes, a global performance series produced by The Hebbel am Ufer (HAU) in Berlin, and first performed at The Soweto Hotel with the script by Mofokeng.