Swimming Home 2013 Hand-woven archival Inkjet prints
69 × 49 cm

‘The Swimmer’ is a short story by American author John Cheever, first published in The New Yorker in 1964. The tale reminds me of a particular mindset and situation that I find familiar to a certain class of white people I knew growing up in the last days of Rhodesia, and then Zimbabwe. Although the narrative is set in North American suburbia, it is an allegory that I think fits especially well into this Southern African context. the story is a blend of realism and surrealism and explores themes of loss, the inevitable passage of time and self-deception, all in a drunken haze.

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