Angela Buckland’s BLOCK A, Thokoza Women’s Hostel is a second instalment of BLOCK A, Jacob’s Mens Hostel. The work extensively elaborates on living conditions in an urban African city.
Thokoza is the oldest women’s hostel in South Africa and is situated in Durban. Originally one of the only residential spaces where black women could live in the city in Apartheid, there is a lot of speculation as to whether they are good or bad for those who live in them, cramped into small living spaces while also being liberated from many familial or patriarchal pressures.
This work intrigued me since it carries such weight, it serves as a valuable piece of documentation and also because, I myself, am finding a greater love for photography as a medium every day. It was an intensive installation process but at the end of the day every experience in the art world ads another thread to your cloth of knowledge and skill.

The doors, each a portal to another room within which anything from three to nine or more people have to share a space meant for only three people.

Getting the bed by the window is something one earns. It also means that you stay in the corner and that there is more of a sense of privacy not having to be between two beds.