The Zeitz Building

Thomas Heatherwick transformed the old silo building into the current museum. Cut away cement from the original silo cylinders to create the stunning atrium. Oval shapes refer to kernels of corn – original use of the building.Sculpture garden on sixth floor with glass tiles lets light in.70% of the structure was removed so called negative architecture, take away rather than add, but it is still sound.

'Five Bhobh: Painting at the End of an Era'

Current temporary exhibition entitled 'Five Bhobh: Painting at the End of an Era' on until March 31,2019. Five Bhobh refers to the average price of a taxi ride; the minibus in Zimbabwe, the artists are the passengers. The exhibition comprises 29 Zimbabwean artists who contemplate the past, present, the future and their own vulnerability.Five Bhobh is a metaphor that fits a nation at the beginning of a journey that may be a rocky ride. Curator Tandazani Dhlakama explains,' the exhibition is about how the artists have captured this moment in history, the anticipation, the angst and the hope, no matter who you are and what party you support.' 

You can see the figures of Ricard Mudariki's painting the 'Passover' in the window of the entrance to the building (see me standing near the window of the shop). The painting shows Robert Mugabe in the centre presiding over the last supper with world leaders seated at the long table, the dead rooster in front of him symbolises the demise of Zimbabwe's ruling party under Robert Mugabe, who sits martyred behind it. Now that Mugabe is gone, will Zimbabwe rise again like a phoenix, the troubled years of the rooster over? 

Permanent exhibition from the Zeitz collection delves into similar issues for the rest of the African continent; post-colonialism and the future of African nations, gender equality and LGBT rights and acceptance. A major theme is coming to terms with traditional culture and values in a modern day 21^st century existence.Most of the artists represented in the permanent collection are under 40 and most of the work was produced this century. 

Norval Museum 

Set in the exquisite wetlands of Steenberg Tokai, Norval opened its doors in April 2018. The sculpture garden features three-dimensional and installation-based artworks from South Africa and Africa. The museum houses the Homestead collection of its founder Louis Norval and puts on 3-4 temporary exhibitions a year exploring different themes of South African and African artists from the 20^th and 21^st century.

Heliostat
This spectaculor 'Wim Botha exhibition' - on until 24 January 2019 - brings together key works in the South African artist's career spanning two decades and is organised around the idea of refraction. Refraction, as understood in optics, is the transformation of light, the increasing or decreasing of its wavelengths, as it passes through a material, such as glass or a prism. We perceive this change in wavelengths as either the splitting of light into its visible spectrum, a rainbow, or the bending or distortion of an object, as in a glass of water. 

The principle of refraction is used by Botha both literally, by applying dichroic filters to glass surfaces throughout the exhibition, and metaphorically, for the transformation of canonical artworks and symbols of Afrikaans identity. A keen pupil of the history of European art, Botha has wrestled with the legacy of seminal art objects from antiquity, the Italian Renaissance and the Baroque throughout his throughout his career, searching for their relevance within a contemporary South African context. Simultaneously, he has taken symbols associated with his Afrikaans identity and shifted their meanings in subtle yet powerful ways.' - from Norval website on the Wim Botha exhibition. 

IMAGE CREDITS

• Allyjm, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
  
• Dave Southwood, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons