all photos from the Kewpie Collection, courtesy the GALA Queer Archives, Johannesburg, SA
In recent years, the representation of queer identities in South Africa has become associated among international audiences with the work of the visual activist Zanele Muholi, whose photographs celebrate the diversity and resilience of LGBTQI+ individuals in the face of homophobia and violence (Salley 2012). South Africa's constitution, adopted in 1996, guarantees its citizens freedom from harassment and discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation. In the years following 1996, legal battles were successfully fought to revoke homophobic legislation and entrench sexual equality in law. Nonetheless, as Muholi's work reveals, there exists a disjuncture between legal rights and the lived experience of LGBTQI+ people, many of whom experience prejudice and violence. While the attention Muholi's work has received is therefore necessary, there remains a need to trace the wider histories and various modes of queer...