South Africa’s new Contemporary Art Museum by Heatherwick Studio

New Contemporary Art Museum
New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

The Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa (Zeitz MOCAA), was unveiled today ahead of its public opening on 22 September 2017 at Cape Town’s V&A Waterfront.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

It will be the world’s largest museum dedicated to contemporary art from Africa and its diaspora and is designed by internationally acclaimed designers Heatherwick Studio, based in London.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

The museum is housed in 9,500 sq metres of custom designed space, spread over nine floors, carved out of the monumental structure of the historic Grain Silo Complex.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

The silo, disused since 1990, stands as a monument to the industrial past of Cape Town, at one time the tallest building in South Africa, now given new life through the transformation by Heatherwick Studio.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

The galleries and the atrium space at the centre of the museum have been carved from the silos’ dense cellular structure of forty-two tubes that pack the building.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

The development includes 6,000 sq metres of exhibition space in 80 gallery spaces, a rooftop sculpture garden, state of the art storage and conservation areas, a bookshop, a restaurant, bar, and reading rooms.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

The museum will also house Centres for a Costume Institute, Photography, Curatorial Excellence, the Moving Image, Performative Practice and Art Education.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

The R500 million (£30 million) development of Zeitz MOCAA, announced in November 2013, has been created in a partnership between the V&A Waterfront and Jochen Zeitz, as a not-for-profit public cultural institution in the heart of one of most visited cultural and historical hubs in Africa.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

Set on the edge of a natural, historic working harbour, with the iconic Table Mountain as its backdrop, and sweeping views of the ocean, city bowl and mountain peaks, V&A Waterfront attracts up to 100,000 people a day.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Photo © Iwan Baan

Thomas Heatherwick, Founder of Heatherwick Studio, said: “The idea of turning a giant disused concrete grain silo made from 116 vertical tubes into a new kind of public space was weird and compelling from the beginning.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Sulpture Garden

The result was a design and construction process that was as much about inventing new forms of surveying, structural support and sculpting, as it was about normal construction techniques.” Source and photos, Courtesy of Heatherwick Studio.

New Contemporary Art Museum
Centre for the Moving
New Contemporary Art Museum
Centre for the Moving
New Contemporary Art Museum
Cyrus Kabiru – Macho Nne
New Contemporary Art Museum
Isaac Julien – Ten Thousand Wave
New Contemporary Art Museum
Ghada Amer
New Contemporary Art Museum
Joël Andrianomearisoa
New Contemporary Art Museum
Kendell Geers
New Contemporary Art Museum
Kudzanai Chiurai
New Contemporary Art Museum
Lungiswa Gqunta – Divider
New Contemporary Art Museum
Mouna Karray
New Contemporary Art Museum
Wangetchi Mutu
New Contemporary Art Museum
Basement
New Contemporary Art Museum
Ground Floor Plan
New Contemporary Art Museum
Level 01 Floor Plan
New Contemporary Art Museum
Level 6_Floor Plan Sculpture Garden

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