The Barnett Collection Volume II - The Star

The photographs in this volume are not intended as a complete pictorial history of this period. The book is an album of pictures taken by the two remarkable brothers, David and Joseph Barnett who were based in Johannesburg. Though they might not always have been aware of it, they were capturing pictorially for succeeding generations fascinating aspects of South Africas chief towns principally Johannesburg. They also photographed events, trivial or catastrophic, but most significant of all, people, and the way they were in those days.

What stands out, perhaps, are the anonymous portraits and family groups. There is nothing candid about them and they are all the more revealing for that. Look in particular, at the women and children. Little has been said about the hardships of the average woman on the raw Witwatersrand goldfields.

The pictures in this book, particularly those of the South African War, are often static and lack the colour and verve of some of the prize photographs by the Barnett brothers. Some aspects of the album have, perforce, been supplemented by the work of other, mostly anonymous pioneer photographers which, however, forms part of The Stars unique collection.