An African Journal; Fine art photography by Horst Klemm, signed de luxe edition (1994)

When the book was self-published by Klemm in Auckland Park, Johannesburg, in 1994, it quickly gained a massive reputation for its striking presentation of Southern African landscapes, wildlife, and rural communities. Because of its exceptional production quality, presentation copies were officially ordered for and placed into the personal libraries of global leaders, icons, and royals. Its recipient list includes:

President Nelson Mandela (marking its release during a monumental year in South African history)

Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom

Queen Margrethe of Denmark

U.S. Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush

Cultural icons like Oprah Winfrey and Elton John

Rather than going through a traditional commercial publishing house, Klemm chose to privately publish the work himself. The first edition was strictly limited to 5,000 numbered and signed copies. To match the high-end nature of the photography, it was given a luxurious quarter-bound finish—typically bound in half-leather and rugged canvas cloth—and housed in a custom slipcase, making it a highly sought-after piece of modern South African book design.

Historically, the book serves as a late-20th-century time capsule of the untamed wilderness across South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe. Klemm, a German-born graphic designer who immigrated to South Africa in 1974, compiled the journal from two decades of personal expeditions. The work captures a transition point in the region's environmental and social history, deliberately focusing on wide, unfenced spaces and fine-art portraits of rural communities before the rapid expansion of modern infrastructure.
Text edited by Denis Smith.

250mm x 330mm x 35mm

Very slight scratches on slipcase.

R1,000