Gallery Talk | "Healing in Apartheid South Africa: Michael Goldblatt's Photographs of the Alex Clinic"

Please join us for a tour of Healing in Apartheid South Africa: Michael Goldblatt's Photographs of the Alex Clinic, led by David Gordon, Roger Howell, Jr. Professor of History, and his students. The tour will begin in the Museum's Pavilion.

On view through February 7, 2027, this exhibition presents Michael Goldblatt's never-before-exhibited photographs of the Alex Health Clinic in Johannesburg's Alexandra Township during the 1980s. The photographs capture community care, activism, and education amid anti-apartheid turmoil, raising broader questions about health care access, inequality, aid, and photography as activism.

This exhibition is curated by David Gordon, Roger Howell, Jr. Professor of History, and students in his spring 2026 course After Apartheid: History and Identity in Contemporary South Africa: Evan Carr ’28, Caitlin Cowan ’26, Avery Cutler ’26, Alec Davis ’28, Thetis Fourli ’26, Jake Reiser ’28, Hazel Sheahan ’28, Lilianna Spartz ’28, Erik Garcia Valtierrez ’27, Elliott Werner ’29, and Collier Zug ’28. Curatorial support was provided by Anne Strachan Cross, Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Curatorial Fellow.

Bowdoin College is committed to providing an accessible and welcoming environment. Please contact the Events Office (events@bowdoin.edu or 207-725-3433) with any questions regarding the accessibility of this event and/or to request accommodations. Please note: some accommodations require advance notice and may require documentation of a disabling condition.

Image: Michael Goldblatt, Alexandra Township, South Africa Polio Vaccination Campaign during Anti-Apartheid Rebellion, 1986, silver gelatin print on paper, 20 x 26 in. Courtesy of David Gordon. 

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