Jillian Edelstein, Desmond Tutu
Stories from The Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa was published by Granta in 2002 with endorsements from Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Michael Ignatieff, Gillian Slovo and Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela.
"Can you combine justice with forgiveness?"
In April 1996 an extraordinary process began in South Africa. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, under its chairman Archbishop Desmond Tutu, held its first public hearings to investigate over thirty years of human rights violations under apartheid. The Commission had been founded in the belief that truth was the only means by which the people of South Africa could come to a common understanding of their past, and that this understanding was necessary if the country was to forge a new national identity in the future. In the first two years more than 20,000 victims made statements to the commissioners and, encouraged by the possibility of amnesty, some 7,000 perpetrators came forward to confess their crimes.
This book tells some of their stories. It is unique in that it puts faces to the personal testimonies of both victims and perpetrators. In the most direct way it documents one of the most important experiments in democratic justice attempted in the 20th century.
https://www.jillianedelstein.com/
You can read the exhibtion texts here.
-
Jillian Edelstein’s work has been published in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The FT Weekend Magazine, Vanity Fair, Interview, Vogue, Port, The Guardian Weekend, The Sunday Times Magazine, Time etc
She has exhibited internationally including London's National Portrait Gallery, The Photographers' Gallery, Royal Academy, Imperial War Museum, Royal Photographic Society, Sothebys, Les Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie Arles, Bensusan & Robben Island Museums in South Africa and Dali International Photography Festival, Yunnan Province, China, Martynas Mažvydas National Library of Lithuania, Rasselmania, Hildesheim, Germany, Photo North, Leeds and Photo Oxford 2025
She has worked with organisations including Oxfam, FXB International, Unicef, Save the Children Fund, Tesco, Nespresso, Sony, National Theatre, Royal Shakespeare Company, Aviva, Tesco, BBC, Comic Relief and Fish Love.
Awarded an Honorary Fellowship RPS, John Kobal Book Award for her book Truth and Lies 2003, other awards include Kodak UK Young Photographer of the Year, Photographers' Gallery Portrait Photographer of the Year, Visa d’Or/International Festival of Photojournalism, Perpignan 1997, European Final Art Polaroid Award, selected AI-AP, Latin American Fotografia 4, World Press Awards, LensCulture Portrait Awards, Julia Margaret Cameron Awards, Portrait of Humanity, Portrait of Britain.
She has completed and won Impact Awards on her feature documentary called the Water Rats about a group of wild cold water swimmers during the Covid lockdown. She is in the final edit/filming of her feature documentary Fever about the BiPolar afflicted, Academy Award nominated American screenwriter, Norman Wexler, who wrote the iconic films of the 70's including Serpico, Joe, Saturday Night Fever.
She was the Keynote speaker for International Women's Day 2025.
Voted one of the ‘Hundred Heroines’ list of international women transforming photography today.
Jillian’s book Here and There: An Expedition of Sorts was published by GOST Books in 2024, and her new book, Affinities, about iconic creative collaborations, will be published by GOST Books in 2026.
Jillian Edelstein
Truth and Lies
The North Wall Arts Centre
South Parade, Summertown,
Oxford,
OX2 7JN
22 October–
9 November
Monday–Saturday
10am–4pm
Sunday, 9 November 12pm–4pm
Exhibition Opening
Thursday, 30 October 6–8pm. All welcome.
Artist’s Talk and Tour
Saturday, 8 November 2–3pm. Booking required.
Special Sunday opening
Sunday, 9 November 12–4pm
Access information: The gallery and accessible toilets are all on one level. There is a further ladies’ toilet on the 1st floor, accessed via a lift. For more access details, click here: Access - The North Wall, Oxford
Location information: How To Find Us - The North Wall, Oxford