This Silo Museum Is a Sight to Behold

The Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa, which opened in late September is the largest museum of contemporary African art in the world.

Made from grain silos decommissioned in 2001, its exterior looks bland and squat. However its interior is an amazing cutaway of concrete tubes. To create such a striking piece of architecture the developers put 500 million rand into the project.

The floor area covers 9500m2 on nine floors and the building has been named in honour of the Zeitz Collection which is also the galleries founding collection. Jochen Zeitz is a German philanthropist who started the Zeitz Collection in 2002 with the goal of creating one of the most representative collections of contemporary art from the African continent. Zeitz will commit his collection, underwrite the running costs of the Museum and provide a substantial acquisition budget to allow the Museum to acquire new important artworks over time to remain on the edge of contemporary cultural production.

Jochen Zeitz said: “Over the last two decades, Africa has played an important role in both my professional and private life. My collection has been strategically built over many years specifically with the goal to create an internationally relevant public contemporary art museum in Africa. After considering many cities across Africa, I am excited to partner with the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town. It is an iconic location in an iconic city, and will be situated in a historic landmark building. This will make my collection accessible to a local, national, continental and international audience.”