Jo Ractliffe, 59, began her career documenting the traumatized landscape of apartheid — homes destroyed, stray dogs roaming through debris. Jo Ractliffe: Drives, opening October 17 at the Art Institute, is the first exhibit to span the artist’s nearly four-decade body of work, much of which explores the way memory and history manifest in the environment. Gelatin silver prints capture moments large and small, like three donkeys found dead on the side of the road, or mass graves and remnants of military bases from the border war that South Africa fought with Angola in the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s. Her critical eye implores us to question how we make sense of what we see, an important prompt during a time when news images on social media often appear divorced from their context.