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Cape Town gallery showcasing modern African art opens

───   10:47 Sat, 23 Sep 2017

Cape Town gallery showcasing modern African art opens | News Article

Cape Town - Africa's largest museum dedicated to the continent's contemporary art opened to the public in Cape Town on Friday, becoming the region's most significant new cultural space in decades.


The Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa is housed in a clutch of abandoned grain silos at the V&A Waterfront that have been transformed with honeycomb lattice windows reflecting the ocean and Table Mountain.

Its main backer is Jochen Zeitz, a former chief executive of sportswear company Puma, and many of the museum's pieces are from his personal collection.

The journey to this week's opening began over a decade ago when the owners of the V&A Waterfront, a popular tourist and shopping destination, set out to rejuvenate a neglected corner of the harbour.

At stake was the future of the hulking grain elevator made up of 118 separate storage compartments that had long since fallen into disuse and filled with pigeon droppings.

After years of extensive remodelling, the silos themselves are now a work of art, their bare concrete cylinders contrasting starkly with the geometric, glass-clad office blocks nearby.

News24

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