Two men building a dam on the farm Drogedal or Droëdal in the Marico Bushveld. This farm and its people, like others in the district, appear in several of Herman Charles Bosman's stories. Years ago there was a more primitive dam here from which Bosman's characters, the 'conservative' Bekkers and de Bruyns, drew water. Their graves, the stones broken but the inscriptions legible, are nearby. And at the verge of the farm, not far from Krisjan Geel's shop at Zwingli, on the 'Government' road to Bechuanaland (Botswana), the remains of Jurie Bekker's postoffice were still (1964) to be seen. Through the thorn trees of Drogedal you can see Abjaterskop, which, when you're lying in the grass, 'looks like the toe of your boot'.

printed 2006
silver gelatin print on fibre paper
32.5 x 46.5cm

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© 2006 Michael Stevenson. All rights reserved.