Truth Games: Melanie Magmoed – brother shot – Dolf Vermeulen

Sue Williamson
Truth Games: Melanie Magmoed – brother shot – Dolf Vermeulen, 1998
Colour laser prints, wood, metal, plastic and perspex
Work: 84 x 121 x 6 cm

In the late afternoon of October 15 1985, security police hiding in crates on the back of a lorry opened fire on children playing in the road in the working-class suburb of Athlone, Cape Town. Shaun Magmoed (16) and two others were killed, and nearly 20 injured in what became known as the ‘Trojan Horse’ shooting. Police said they had opened fire because the children were throwing stones. Scores of witnesses denied this. The police, under the command of Lt. Dolf Vermeulen, defended their action, saying it was ‘a necessary technique to protect ordinary road users’. Truth Games is a configuration of text and image that complicates our relationship with the truth. Through this work, Williamson considers the process of remembering painful histories that occurred in apartheid South Africa. Made with laminated laser prints, wood, metal and plastic, Truth Games draws out media reports and testimonies from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).