Writing in the Mail & Guardian, Shaun de Waal looks at three photographic books that illuminate our history, and raise some intriguing questions about the present.

Republished late last year, Then and Now (Highveld) highlights the work of eight South African photographers and contrasts their work during the apartheid era with their work in the new democracy. Put together by Paul Weinberg, it is the companion volume to a travelling exhibition. Seven of the eight photographers were associated with the Afrapix collective, which did much to document the upheavals of the 1980s. Many images here are iconic, and that's not just because some of them appeared in The Weekly Mail. The photograph by Paul Weinberg (who also edited the book) of a lone woman raising her fists to two Casspirs feels as though it sums up the whole era.

The eighth photographer in the book is David Goldblatt, who was not an Afrapix member but was indubitably a kind of spiritual father to that generation of South African photographers. The contrasts between "then" and "now" are not necessarily as stark as one might expect; often there is an ironic resonance between the images of the two eras.

It is fascinating, though, to see how these socially engaged photographers have extended their work into the era of democracy.
Read the rest of the review...