Documenting SA's bicycle culture
2010-09-08 11:18
Petro-Anne Morkel, News24
Cape Town - Two young cycling enthusiasts have launched a project investigating South African bicycle culture by travelling across the country photographing average citizens with their bicycles.
Nic Grobler and Stan Engelbrecht started with this project, The Bicycle Portraits, in January 2010 and have documented South African cyclists from Cape Town to Pretoria with the aim of turning their findings into a book.
“We stop whoever we meet in the road,” said Grobler. “There is a whole range of people we have met so far.”
SLIDESHOW: Keep on pedalling
Eighty-two year old Stephanie Baker from Pretoria is one of the people they have photographed. According to their website, Baker uses her bicycle every other day to get around.
“The people she lives with at the retirement home are too scared to go to the shops, but (Baker) meets people along the way and has a completely different mindset,” said Grobler. “When you cycle, people aren’t so alienated from each other. It’s almost jovial.”
Contemporary look
Grobler described their project as “a contemporary look at South African culture”.
“Compared to other African countries, and countries like Switzerland and the Netherlands, I found that more people use bicycles there than (South Africans) do… I feel that due to our socio economic climate bicycles can be good for South Africa.”
He hopes the book will encourage more people to use bicycles as modes of transport.
While some of the cyclists they interviewed use bicycles as they cannot afford cars or taxis, others simply love cycling.
“In Woodstock there was a 10-year-old riding around late at night and we asked him why. He said: ‘I just love to ride around’.”
Photographic book
Grobler and Engelbrecht aim to turn this project into a self-published hardcover photographic book by using Kickstarter, a fundraising social network, to collect about R252 000.
According to Grobler, the fundraising process has been divided into three phases. During the first phase they had collected over R108 222 through people pre-ordering the book for R380 from Bicycle Portrait’s Kickstarter webpage. The money was used for travelling, shooting, writing and preparing collected content.
They will need a further R54 116 for the second phase, which will centre on design and layout. According to their Kickstarter webpage, they have “39 backers” who have pledged 32% of the money needed.
During the third and final phase, they have to raise an additional R90 172 to cover the costs of printing and binding 3 000 copies.
“Some say that it’s too dangerous to cycle, but it’s just as dangerous to drive your car,” said Grobler.
“But the environment (for bicycles) can improve if we can get more people out there to cycle.”
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