honorable mention
Julia Runge
title
Shebeen Queens
The project "Shebeen Queens” focuses on the female entrepreneurs who have been able to assert themselves as strong, emancipated women within this often dangerous scene.
What they all have in common is the will and also the self-conception to fight for their independence every day despite poverty and lack of support.
Today, the image of the shebeens remain an ambivalent figure for a wide-range of social manifestations. While shebeens are places of emancipation and subculture, their environments also channel alcoholism and crime. The tension in this social phenomenon reproduces and exacerbates colonial historical structures.
In my photos, I immerse myself in the world of these places and - from the viewpoint of an observer - tell analogous & decelerated, quite & confidential stories about these places and their owners. In pursuing this project, I hope to enable a new way of seeing the contemporary experiences of shebeen culture and phenomena within the local society, particularly in light of Germany’s renewed effort to examine its colonial past.
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entry description
The work "Shebeen Queens" is dedicated to the illegal bar culture of southern Africa and its predominantly female owners - the Shebeen Queens. The word "shebeen" comes from the Irish “síbín” and connotes a bar where alcoholic drinks are served without a license. In response to colonial politics and apartheid, these places initially served as a refuge for indigenous people, who were persecuted in the public sphere. These bars, which first started in township living rooms, spread and grew in the shadow of illegality to become commercial bars and subcultural hubs.The project "Shebeen Queens” focuses on the female entrepreneurs who have been able to assert themselves as strong, emancipated women within this often dangerous scene.
What they all have in common is the will and also the self-conception to fight for their independence every day despite poverty and lack of support.
Today, the image of the shebeens remain an ambivalent figure for a wide-range of social manifestations. While shebeens are places of emancipation and subculture, their environments also channel alcoholism and crime. The tension in this social phenomenon reproduces and exacerbates colonial historical structures.
In my photos, I immerse myself in the world of these places and - from the viewpoint of an observer - tell analogous & decelerated, quite & confidential stories about these places and their owners. In pursuing this project, I hope to enable a new way of seeing the contemporary experiences of shebeen culture and phenomena within the local society, particularly in light of Germany’s renewed effort to examine its colonial past.
about the photographer
Julia Runge was born in Berlin in 1990 , lived and worked from 2010 to 2012 in Namibia , Africa. She completed her degree in photography in 2015 with the photography project „Basterland“ at the Ostkreuzschule in Berlin. In her photographic work, Julia Runge primarily deals with social commitment and social structures as well as cultural topics in Africa. She uses her natural and empathetic pictorial language to open an artistic insight into the subject. Julia currently lives and works in Berlin.back to gallery