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Challenge and Transformation: Museums in Cape Town and Sydney
KATHERINE J. G O O D N O W
with Jack Lohman
& Jatti Bredekamp
2006
Éditions U N E S C O - B P I / P U B
1, rue Miollis - 75015 Paris
First published in 2006
Copyright © Katherine G o o d n o w
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The designations employed and the presentation of
material throughout this publication do not imply the
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U N E S C O and ILO concerning the legal status of any
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Table of Contents
8 F O R E W O R D
10 PREFACE
12 I N T R O D U C T I O N TO T H E SERIES
Museums and Diversity
Design and Diversity: Future World Museums
Jack Lohman
M U S E U M S IN CAPE T O W N A N D SYDNEY
22 C H A P T E R i.Introduction and Overview
35 C H A P T E R 2. Across Museums: Shared Forms of Challenge and Change
53 C H A P T E R 3. Ethnographic Collections in Natural History Museums:
The South African Museum
77 C H A P T E R 4. Sydney's Australian Museum and its Indigenous Australians Gallery
102 C H A P T E R 5. Historic Sites: Cape Town
144 C H A P T E R 6. The Museum of Sydney: O n the Site of the First Government House
166 C H A P T E R 7.The South African National Gallery
190 C H A P T E R 8. The Yiribana Gallery: Sydney
207 C H A P T E R 9 . Future Steps
Katherine Goodnow
214 EPILOGUE
Jatti Bredekamp
Foreword
ON T H E BASIS of its unique mandate in the field of culture, for more
than a decade U N E S C O has highlighted the challenges facing cultural
diversity and has promoted greater recognition of its importance through
discussions at experts and governmental levels. U N E S C O ' s efforts culmi
nated at the international level in the adoption, at the 33rd session of its
General Conference in October 2005, of the Convention on the Protection
and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions.
It is against this background that the series on " M u s e u m s and Diversity"
- the outcome of collaboration between U N E S C O , the M u s e u m of London,
Iziko M u s e u m s of South Africa, the University of Bergen and the Bergen
National Academy of the Arts - should be understood. The purpose of the
series is to stimulate intercultural dialogue in an innovative way amongst
institutions which, by virtue of their mandate as guardians of collections,
must approach scientific studies and interpretative presentations as a web
of relations between scholars and specialists of different historical periods
and regions; these relations occur at national, regional and international
levels. It is envisaged that these series also will support the educational
mission of m u s e u m s , aimed at both the general public and the community
of scholars, by casting them as microcosms of diversity whose messages
can facilitate the search for harmonious cooperation and improved mutual
understanding. Indeed, the series represents a pioneering initiative to
explore cultural diversity from the multidisciplinary perspective of muse
u m s and to create the conditions for a better understanding of history and
collections, especially by questioning assumptions and revisiting interpre
tations which might have become outdated.
The aim of the series is to explore h o w m u s e u m s can best contribute
to the construction and development of intercultural dialogue and to
disseminate U N E S C O ' s values as expressed in its normative texts. In the
process, n e w avenues for analysis and action should be opened up to all
8 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
of U N E S C O ' s M e m b e r States and the communities served by m u s e u m s
around the world. By establishing reports on good practices, which will be
available on the U N E S C O website, the series will be useful to institutions
seeking to learn from others' experience and draw upon the latest develop
ments in contemporary interpretative practice.
The first volume presents, m u s e u m s in Australia and South
Africa, which invited all their stakeholders to challenge long-estab
lished and unquestioned patterns of cultural sensitivity. Difficult
questions such as: "Whose narrative is presented in the m u s e u m ? " and
" W h o is speaking in museums?" were debated from a number of differing
perspectives, as a preliminary step towards inclusiveness of a number of
voices in communities which, so far, had remained silent. The case studies
present the ethical foundations of the methodological approach as well as
the processes necessary for transforming the museums , especially through
new aspects of design and display and new policies for staffing and
training.
In conclusion, U N E S C O considers that the series, by presenting schol
arly and innovative approaches towards delicate and often neglected top
ics, will be a stimulus for constructive intercultural dialogue both within
m u s e u m s and amongst m u s e u m s . In addition, w e hope that the series will
encourage countries sharing a c o m m o n history to reinterpret their past
links - through joint efforts of mutual enrichment - in order to achieve a
clearer presentation and more accurate interpretation of their collections.
KOICHIRO MATSUURA
Director-General of UNESCO
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 9
Preface
IN A W O R L D O F increasing and intensifying change, people turn to those
institutions which provide links to a past, less complicated time when,
supposedly, people had a clearer understanding of the meaning of things.
M u s e u m s are places in which meaning is sought, given and sometimes even
found. In this sense museums are sacred spaces and those w h o work in them
are a kind of priestly caste.
It is to our m u s e u m s that m a n y turn in order to ask questions relating
to the when , what, h o w and increasingly, the w h y of life.
Like the great cathedrals of Christendom (according to the Dutch
theologian, Albert von der Heuwel) m u s e u m s are 'temples of dialogue' in
which people of differing tongue and varying hue seek to make conversa
tion, where the voiceless seek to find expression and where meaning fills
the silence.
The world's great m u s e u m s are sought out as places of pilgrimage to
which the faithful make regular hadj. M a n y are revered as m u c h for the
power of their architectural design to lift our gaze as for their content to
mystify and awe our spirit. M u s e u m objects are as holy as any relic to be
found in any church; they are as sacramental in that they are 'outward
expressions with inner meaning'. M u s e u m s have their codes and c o m
mandments , their adherents and their detractors. They are prone to all the
blessings and curses of their sacred counterparts.
Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks in his book 'The Dignity of Difference'
acknowledges the role of the great faiths in providing 'meaning and pur
pose for their adherents'. H e goes on to ask 'Can they make space for those
who are not its adherents, who sing a different song, hear a different music, tell
a different story?' This is the subject of this first volume of ' M u s e u m s and
Diversity'. It concerns the age-old problem which is at the heart of religious
searching: ' W h a t is truth and whose truth?' As question seeks answer so
does it open the door for dialogue.
10 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <w MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Sacks defines 'religion' as that which binds and forms people into c o m
munity. It is in this sense also that m u s e u m s play a crucial role in c o m
munity. M u s e u m s bind and form us in and through the diverse dialogue of
their collections consciously and sensitively woven into a mega-narrative
of the community's self-understanding. H e contrasts this with the role of
politics which he defines as 'mediating conflict, adjudicating conflicting
claims and providing frameworks of peaceful coexistence'.
M u s e u m s are therefore representative of two of the major phenomena
of our existence, religion and politics, playing as they do the essential c o m
plementary roles of binding and mediating. Both these activities require
that dialogue between all the voices representing the community is encour
aged and engaged. As with religion and politics, the dialogue will at times
be unclear, painful and strident and m a y even break d o w n . Yet even these
moments need airing in the space the m u s e u m affords if w e are to find
each other as w e must and discover 'the angels of our better nature'. It m a y
yet be that where our priests and politicians have failed, our curators - lit
erally, those w h o care - m a y yet help us to find each other in these temples
of dialogue and, in facing each other, k n o w ourselves (as in the words of
Irenaeus, 2nd century Bishop of Lyons) 'in a fantastic sob of recognition'.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu, speaking of humankind's inescapable inter
dependence and the need to live creatively with diversity, posits the African
view: ' W e say in our African idiom that a person is a person through other
people. The African view rejects the popular dichotomies between the
sacred and the secular, the material and the spiritual. All is of a piece.' It is
this philosophy which fueled the dramatic political and social changes in a
nation seemingly doomed to self-destruct because of its diversity, bringing
about both its transformation and reconciliation. South Africa learnt that
the language of reconciliation is dialogue.
This first of the series ' M u s e u m s and Diversity' is therefore critical
beyond the import it holds for the m u s e u m community. It is a vital con
tribution to the wider discourse so sadly lacking in the complex and frag
mented world of our day, searching as w e are for n e w words and meaning
and for creative dialogue in our yet-to-be global community.
D R . COLIN JONES
Archbishop Desmond Tutu's Special Envoy
Former Dean of St. George's Cathedral, Cape Town and
Past Chair oflziko Museums
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 11
Introduction to the Series
TH E M A N Y D I M E N S I O N S of cultural diversity in museums have
steadily grown over the last five years into seriously complex issues of
representation, accessibility and intercultural dialogue. W e are all learning
- by our o w n mistakes and by the examples set by others. This series is a step
towards sorting out some of these issues as they appear in a variety of social,
political and economic contexts around the world.
Cultural diversity is not only an issue for countries with a high level
of immigration or with a colonial past but a modern reality that all
m u s e u m s and countries are facing. G o o d practice varies from one country
or context to another. There are, however, some c o m m o n themes that w e
all face, dominated by issues of inclusivity, of consultation and of ensur
ing two-way dialogue rather than a simple subject-object view. At the heart
of these is the underlying need to develop good practice applicable to the
cultural politics of representing others.
The first volume in this series is concerned with the issue of dialogue.
It poses questions w e m a y have heard before but which have been rarely
answered. It asks whose narrative is it? W h o is speaking in museums? It
reflects the growing self-awareness that our old methods of speaking,
labelling and categorising others in our societies no longer benefit them.
Dialogue and spaces to speak are particularly important in countries
that have repressed the stories of others - or more recently essentialised
these into an exotic other, in particular for cultural tourism. Dialogue by
allowing others to speak within our m u s e u m spaces is one step towards
intercultural dialogue and towards healing and reconciliation.
The need to create dialogue and cultural sensitivity, however, is not only
an axiom in countries such as Australia and South Africa, it is an issue
for all countries. The strategies initiated by major political change or the
growing politicisation of indigenous groups offer insights for us all. These
are countries that have had to face their o w n practices of representation,
12 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
reconsider them and bring about change. W e can learn from them.
This volume does so by looking at the underlying reasons and goals for
the initial creation of the museums , the stakeholders involved, the expecta
tions and methods of collection. It recognises that w e are all slow to change
our disciplinary outlooks, our ingrained m u s e u m practices, our concepts
of what museums are and the manner in which things shall be explained
and exhibited.
Change and transformation in society and in the media in its broadest
sense has gradually become reflected in our museums . H o w they do so, and
with what actors and strategies, is then the focus of the volume. The book
opens with an essay on h o w w e must consider aspects of design within dis
play itself as part of the issue of diversity and representation. Decisions on
staffing and profiling all too often become the sole focal point regarding
issues of representation. Staffing is important, but what m u s e u m employees
do - the very complexity of the arrangement of objects, texts and sounds
- needs to be scrutinized more closely for the opportunities and possibilities
of emerging good practice.
The second volume in the series - The Politics of H u m a n Remains and
M u s e u m Practice - takes on issues of the collecting and display of h u m a n
remains. It addresses our central concerns of representation and politics:
w h o has the remains and w h o wants them back? The book also is a move
towards bridging the gap between archaeologists and First People, those
with seemingly contradictory medical and ethical claims, by offering a
variety of arguments and perspectives on h u m a n remains - both for reten
tion and return.
The series also includes companion shorter reports on museums and cul
tural diversity in Ghana, with a particular focus on Northern Ghana. Latin
America is highlighted in two forthcoming volumes which look at diver
sity practice in Chile and indigenous revivalism in the Andes: in Bolivia,
Ecuador and Peru.
M y personal thanks go to Kate G o o d n o w for her inspiring energy and
enthusiasm and to: Michiko Tanaka, Johan Haarberg, Nina Malterud
and Kirsti Koch Christensen for their determined support of the project.
I would also like to thank the publication series Advisory Committee
for all their ideas: Minja Yang, Alissandra C u m m i n s , D a w n Casey, Jatti
Bredekamp, Darryl Mclntyre and Mark Patton. Finally, to the staff of Iziko
and the M u s e u m of London - thank you for inspiring us.
O n behalf of the series editors and the members of our Advisory C o m
mittee, I hope that these volumes are rewarding and m a y enrich our under
standing of intercultural dialogue, diversity and m u s e u m practice.
JACK L O H M A N
Director, Museum of London and
Professor, Bergen National Academy of the Arts
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 13
Design And Diversity:
Future World Museums
Jack Lohman
IN 1910, SIR G E O R G E B I R D W O O D - once Art
Referee for the Indian Section of the South Ken
sington Museum (precursor to the Victoria and Albert
Museum in London) - likened a Javanese figure of the
Buddha displayed at the Royal Society of Arts in London
to a boiled suet pudding. A century has passed since then
and with it, one hopes, that sense of cultural superiority
that n o w looks increasingly like the worst sort of paro
chialism. It was a product of its time, perhaps, but is no
longer a product for our o w n .
The century's passage marks a n e w and inspiring
sense of the diversity m u s e u m s ought always to have
been about: the multiple aspects of a single subject, the
m a n y cultural forms of a particular time or place, the
various peoples of the world both n o w and then. The
content has always been there, but for a long time spoke
only to the few: the collectors themselves, the curators
and keepers, the experts w h o came to consult the works
for study and scholarship.
The evolution of the public m u s e u m has seen a
remarkable change. Doors have opened wider and the
technologies that shape our society are n o w more read
ily incorporated into displays and exhibitions. The
world m u s e u m is less a repository than an experience:
considered, designed and achieved with an audience
- hopefully m a n y audiences - in mind.
The fate of the Herbert W a r d Collection of nearly
3000 African artefacts, n o w in the Smithsonian Insti
tution, shows h o w far we've come. Herbert W a r d was a
Londoner w h o set off as an adventurous young m a n to
travel the globe. H e sailed to N e w Zealand and Australia,
and then travelled to Borneo and on to Africa. His tales
of the Congo were bestsellers in the early 1890s.1
Photographs of Ward's studio in Paris show a highly
designed display of the materials he gathered during
his travels: fans of knives and spears, elegant arrays
of mounted tools and musical instruments. His 'curi
osities' were given a strange art-nouveau beauty (not
so different, perhaps, from the perspex prettiness of
the British M u s e u m ' s o w n new African galleries). As
Mary-Jo Arnoldi points out,
"This self-conscious and painstakingly designed
installation, with walls of weapons (recalling medi
eval European great halls), hunting trophies, numer
ous small objects, oriental rugs and animal skins, all
bathed in a gloomy atmosphere evocative of darkest
Africa, dramatically contributed to Ward's invention
of an exotic Africa".2
Given the collection in 1913, the Smithsonian tried to
preserve something of Ward's style within the demands
of the museum's ethnographic approach. Gloomy light
ing and fanciful arrays were maintained alongside a
scholarly model no less objectifying, a strange blend of
atmosphere and anthropology. It's the labels that give the
game away. African artefacts were seen to "strive" toward
a European aesthetic sophistication. "The implied stand-
14 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
ard of comparison was always modern Western society,
and the 'primitive' was clearly identified as developmen-
tally inferior in every category".'
It was, of course, untenable. Times changed and the
Ward Collection was finally dispersed in 1961. Exoticism
modulated into ethnology (with its o w n implied exoti
cism) and finally merged into what the International
Council of M u s e u m s ( I C O M ) n o w defines as the core
function of a m u s e u m : to "communicate and exhibit,
for the purposes of study, education and enjoyment,
material evidence of people and their environment".
Not curiosities, not tribes or valleys, but people. At last.
Diversity has to be seen as a function of display. W e
have to ask ourselves: h o w do m u s e u m s establish iden
tity today? H o w does the presentation of material pose
certain questions about race, gender, age or religion and,
more elusively, what questions does it fail to pose? W e
have to develop our communicative competence and
move away, as w e are starting to, from a largely m o n o -
cultural visitor profile.4 W e have to k n o w what w e are
doing, and what w e are saying by what w e are doing.
The placement of the Hawaiian war god Kuka'ilimoku
in the former M u s e u m of Mankind in London makes
a useful point.5 Like the Greek sculpture of Nike of
Samothrace (the famous "Winged Victory"), the Hawai
ian god was meant to be observed from below. Once
moved to a m u s e u m , like Nike in the Louvre in Paris,
he was indeed placed at the top of a stairwell where he
could be approached from a lower position. But unlike
Nike, one of the Louvre's more popular attractions
which people were encouraged to visit, Kuka'ilimoku
was placed on high more from curatorial interest than
public awareness. W h o knew what they were approach
ing or that they were to approach him from below? W h o
paid attention? Perhaps he was stuck in his niche out of
convenience, or decoratively. A n informed m u s e u m
must not only show cultural sensitivity in its presenta
tion, it must communicate what it knows - and good
design can do this.
The issues are not simple. M u c h of the discussion on
diversity has been focused not on design, but on activi
ties and staffing. C o m m u n i t y activity is very m u c h a
lively part of m u s e u m culture. Education and outreach
programmes, n e w forms of collecting and so forth are
thriving. Staffing is a thornier issue and one very m u c h
caught up in the debate over cultural authority. The
American Association of M u s e u m s ( A A M ) promotes
the adoption of diversity plans in m u s e u m s by noting:
" M a n y communities are currently under-represented
in and under-served by m u s e u m s . M u s e u m s that
diversify their audiences, employees and collabora
tors can help ensure future financial stability, broader
cross-cultural understanding, the indispensable asset
of community goodwill, and the increased intellec
tual capital gained through diverse perspectives and
experiences".6
O n the issue of employees, Eileen Hooper-Greenhill
agrees:
"Traditionally m u s e u m s have chosen their staff on
the grounds of their subject and collection k n o w
ledge . . . It is becoming more imperative to employ
people because of their knowledge and experience of
audiences, and w h o from their cultural backgrounds
will also be able to offer more diverse approaches to
the interpretation of the collections".7
Change is afoot, and it is one which will impact not just
on diversity of approach ("the interpretation of the col
lections") but on the architectural and design professions
themselves w h o present those collections to the public.
As the architect and lawyer Theodore Landsmark writes:
Ward, H . (1890) Five Years with the Congo Cannibals. London: Chatto & Windus
Arnoldi, M.J. ( 1992) "A Distorted Mirror: The Exhibition of the Herbert Ward Collection
of Africana". In I. Karp, C M . Kreamer & S. Lavine (Eds.) Museums and Communities: The
Politics of Public Culture. Washington D . C : Smithsonian Institution Press, p.437
ibid, pp. 446-449 4
Hooper-Greenhill, E. 11997) 'Towards Plural Perspectives". In E. Hooper-Greenhill (Ed.)
Cultural Diversity: Developing Museum Audiences in Britain. London: Leicester University
Press, pp. 1-2
See A.L . Kaeppler (1992) "Ali i and Maka'ainana: The Representation of Hawaiians in
Museums at H o m e and Abroad". In I. Karp, C M . Kreamer & S. Lavine (Eds.) Op.cit.,
pp.458-475
A A M (2003-4) Developing a Diversity Plan.
' Hooper-Greenhill, E (1997) Op.cit., pp.8-9
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <** MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 15
"If w e believe our profession benefits from being of the
world w e serve, as well as in it . . . w e must diversify
our professional ranks. To fail to do so is tantamount
to projecting the image that multiple design identi
ties are not a necessary component of addressing
diverse client needs, and that our work is irrelevant
to the vast majority of people w h o n o w constitute the
world's population".8
Design can and will do this. M u s e u m s can reach out
to n e w communities and can welcome newcomers in.
There are risks involved. The problem of tokenism can
already be seen in the sometimes limited forms of c o m
munity consultation that go on. Such approaches are
keen for n e w content, but want the final say and are not
so keen for input on presentation, argument and that
authoritative voice with which museums have got used
to speaking. The taint of criticism is also one museums
fear, for they see themselves as repositories of expertise
which cannot be perceived to get things wrong (and
given the pressures for funding, not wanting to risk
any adverse criticism is understandable if unadvent-
urous). The dialogue between some communities and
their m u s e u m presenters m a y be tricky. Take the remarks
of George Erasmus, former national chief of the Canadian
Assembly of First Nations:
" W e are well aware that m a n y people have dedi
cated their time, careers and their lives showing what
they believe is an accurate picture of indigenous
peoples. W e thank you for that, but w e want to turn
the page".9
Moira Simpson captures this frustrating paradox for
m u s e u m s w h o see themselves as sympathetic portrayers,
not cultural cynics:
"As exhibitions become more contemporary in out
look, and m a k e more attempt to address issues of
political intent, racial bias and inaccurate histori
cal representation, they inevitably become more
controversial. By their nature, these exhibitions have
challenged popular beliefs, national ideologies and
the images of some national heroes: consequently
they have not always been well received by critics and
the public. This m a y draw some unexpected public
responses to exhibitions which were intended to be
sensitive, innovative and inclusive, even w h e n efforts
have been m a d e to incorporate the views of the
community".10
There is something of an older debate here, too, that
between the m u s e u m as a place of wonder and its role
as a place of connection and community, between what's
strange and unique and what's typical and relevant.
Writing of certain religious objects of no particularan-
tiquity or beauty in the State Jewish M u s e u m in Prague,
historian Stephen Greenblatt notes that "their resonance
depends not upon visual stimulation but upon a felt
intensity of names, and behind the names, as the very
term resonance suggests, of voices: the voices of those
w h o changed, studied, muttered their prayers, wept and
then were forever silenced".11
Whether depicting aboriginal cultures or religious
history, m u s e u m s have to find this resonance. Wonder
doesn't disappear: what's wondrous, if presented in a
fashion that speaks to people, m a y be in fact what you
begin to understand.
Seductive spaces
W h e n design engages meaningfully with diversity, its
results are rewarding rather than problematic. The
effects of design operate at all levels, from the largest-
scale architectural project to the tiniest fibre-optic light
sequence in a glass case. The sensitivities described above
are not limitations: they are an exciting set of n e w vari
ables. G o o d designers will work with them. The focus
must be on people. Buildings are not autonomous struc
tures; they participate in the lives of those around them.
The architect Colin St John Wilson argues that " w e can
still be deeply moved by buildings".12
Anyone w h o has seen Daniel Libeskind's Jewish
M u s e u m in Berlin or Tadao Ando's Church of the Light
in Osaka is unlikely to deny the fact. St John Wilson
shows that a building's presence can have a meaningful
tension between assertiveness and openness, between a
lofty façade that challenges and demands submission,
and deflected planes which welcome and invite.13 The
16 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «< MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
architectural effects are not simply observed: they are
experienced.
Such an understanding is crucial to the m u s e m s w e
build and rebuild. The urban landscape is as relevant
to people's lives as the natural one, and both have a pre
existing relationship with the visitors w h o will, quite
literally, 'make their way' to the collections. The built
space enters into dialogue with a longstanding set of
experiences and can have a powerful, if occasionally
unforeseen, effect w h e n outside designers are brought in.
Colour too can be strongly significant. Lois Swirnoff's
The Color of Cities emphasizes architectural colour's key
relationship to environment:
"The abiding arbiter in marking color choices should
be the context. A designer needs to analyze the
city environment, the surrounding buildings, and
above all the quality of light in the particular place.
Vernacular choices seem to arise after long periods of
observation, and are collective. While a designer m a y
not make decisions by committee, it is important that
he or she become aware of local constraints upon the
individual selection of color and be sensitive to the
impact it m a y have on a building façade or street".14
"Vernacular choices" here covers a wide ground, and
Swirnoff m a y not go far enough in acknowledging the
potent significance of colour for diverse communities.
"Becoming aware" needs to be more proactive. Designers
should engage and include the meanings the community
can provide.
The Smithsonian's n e w National M u s e u m of the
American Indian ( N M A I ) draws on these n e w models
of design. The consultation process was far-reaching
and the m a n y conversations with Indians throughout
the western hemisphere informed the design of the
m u s e u m building, as well as the content and philosophy
of the museum's exhibitions and public programmes.
The m u s e u m wants visitors to understand what it
means to be welcomed to a native place. The N M A I has
sought what it calls a native sensibility and the design
team drew on an appropriate palette of colours, materi
als, symbols and forms - from lunar events recorded in
the piazza to the Potomac wall inset with prisms to cel
ebrate the sun. There is a welcome wall impressed with
words of greeting in hundreds of native languages from
across the Americas. Even the detailing of functional
venues such as theatres aims to capture a native feel
ing, in this case by establishing the sort of space used by
native storytellers.15
Architectural sensibility can work wonders for m u s
eums, but it requires thoughtful and detailed consulta
tion. It m a y also require participation. The imbalance
between the producers of the built space and the ever-
divergent communities w h o use them will continue to
reveal its limitations until the communities themselves
become the producers.16 Consultation can only travel so
far. Legislation, too - complying with agreed codes of
practice - is too narrow an approach to diversity:
"The operative point of view for designers (whether
architects, landscape architects, interior design
ers, engineers, industrial designers, web designers or
wayfinders) becomes one of empathy for the h u m a n
condition; in universal design, solutions reflect the
diversity of h u m a n abilities - throughout the range
Landsmark, T. 12003) 'Isolation and Diversity in Architecture'. In L. Krisk (Ed.l Twenty on
20/20 Vision: Perspectives on Diversity and Design. Boston: AIA Diversity Committee and
Boston Society of Architects, p.3
Quoted as epigraph to Moira Simpson (1998) Making Representations: Museums in the Post-
Colonial Era. London and N e w York: Routledge
'"ibid, pp.25-26
S. Greenblatt (1991) "Resonance and Wonder". In I. Karp & S. Lavine (Eds.) Exhibiting Cul
ture: The Poetics and Politics of Museum Display. Washington D . C . : Smithsonian Institution
Press, p.47
~ St lohn Wilson, C . ( 1989) "The Natural Imagination: A n Essay on the Experience of Archi
tecture", Architectural Digest 1103 (January 1989), p. 64.
I3ibid,p.68
[4
Swirnoff, L. (2000) The Colour of Cities: An International Perspective. N e w York: McGraw-
Hill, p. 115
The scale of the N M A I undertaking is enormous. As the Toronto Star reported, here na
tive people have taken ownership not only of an exhibition but of an entire institution (7
August 2004). See the Smithsonian N M A I website for a fuller description of the process:
www.nmai.si.edu
See Kathryn H . Anthony (2001) Designing for Diversity: Gender, Race, and Ethnicity in the
Architectural Profession Champaign. IL: University of Illinois Press. The problems are not
simply ones of race. The Baghdad-born British architect Zaha Hadid became the first
woman to win the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 2004. As Benjamin Forgey noted in the
Washington Post "The choice of Hadid to receive what is widely thought to be architecture's
most prestigious award focuses attention on the increasing stature of women in a tradition
ally male-dominated profession. But recognition from the Pritzker committee is perhaps
late in coming. In 1991 the selection committee created a controversy when it selected
American architect Robert Venturi for the prize but failed to name Denise Scott Brown,
Venturi's longtime partner and wife". (22 March 2004)
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 17
of life. Although codes m a y help ensure compliance
where the society has proved intransigent, the ulti
mate answer to universal design lies in employing our
full imaginative and aesthetic gifts in a n e w way of
seeing".17
You can start by legislating change and insisting on
compliance, but the successes will come when the spirit
behind the legislation has been understood and absorbed,
not the letter of its demands. A n d it does occur. Archi
tecture that makes sense to its communities is there to be
seen. The splendour of N e w Zealand's Te Papa M u s e u m
in Wellington derives in part from its connection to
the landscape, from the marvel of its massive engineer
ing along an earthquake faultline to the sheer delight
of its bright bands of colour facing the sun and sea as
its islanders have always done. The Tehran M u s e u m of
Contemporary Art in Iran draws successful inspiration
from both traditional Iranian and modern architecture.
Its four towering semi-circular skylights are architectur
ally dramatic against the open skies, functionally impor
tant (drawing d o w n natural light into the galleries) and
metaphorically significant, making familiar reference to
Iranian windcatchers. It's a building that speaks not just
to its o w n community, but to all comers.
The best building, of course, is only as good as its
interior. The sense of frustration and disappointment
one feels w h e n a magnificent architectural statement
is let d o w n by its mumbling inner design is profound.
W h e n it comes to diversity, the concern is even greater.
A building m a y have engaged meaningfully with the
natural and built space around it, and responded to the
people w h o have lived and continue to live there. But
that environmental gesture is negated if what's inside
does not also carry the message. Communi ty meaning
ought not to be a gesture at all, and certainly must not
look that way: it has to be incorporated, an integral part
of the entire m u s e u m experience.
If what's displayed and h o w are the fundamental
aspects of what a m u s e u m communicates about the
people its collections represent, then that cultural sym
bolism must be met by thoughtful design. The U K ' s
Council for M u s e u m , Libraries and Archives ( M L A )
understands this as one of the key protocols to effect a
'renaissance' in Britain's regional m u s e u m s . Not only is
the redisplay of collections to consider a broader range
of users (and so display hitherto unseen or overlooked
objects), but using n e w design techniques to redisplay
old exhibits is exactly the way to m a p m u s e u m content
onto relevant contemporary form.18
The shifts of emphasis have been seen in m u s e u m
display across the world: an interest in openness rather
than enclosure, the use of n e w technologies to enhance
the visitor experience (discussed below), the recogni
tion that our approach to m u s e u m objects needs to
create a relationship with them more closely resem
bling that of the people w h o m a y have m a d e or held the
objects originally. "Everything in a m u s e u m , " as Svet-
lana Alpers has noted, "is put under pressure of a way of
seeing"." Looking is rich, but creates a limiting and hier
archical relationship. It keeps the viewer at one remove
and exludes the other senses. Thankfully you can n o w
touch things in m u s e u m s , or press a button and listen
to recorded voices from the past. Designing these things
in has created a more diverse experience and thus more
closely connects to the past w e are trying to express.
Lighting too is essential. M u s e u m design can fall into
an obsession with the very materialism of objects them
selves. Its presence can become a series of new things:
glamorous display cases, plasma screens, handling
arrays and listening posts. It's almost as if it feels the
need to compete and occasionally overwhelm the actual
collections. Yet h o w people feel in these spaces, as well
as h o w they see, will be strongly determined by h o w the
rooms are lit. Lighting moves people through a space
and determines not just h o w the objects look, but the
ambience of the overall display. Nor should lighting be
thought of as a fixed part of the building: a fixture on
a wall requiring a replaced bulb periodically. It needs
functional flexibility and staffing (for its design is never
over) so that it can change in accordance with n e w
exhibits and different visitors, different times of year or
different events.20 Diversity m a y be in part an incorpo
ration of the principle of change into our displays, m a k
ing them less fixed and authoritative and more open to
revision and rethinking as w e welcome n e w visitors in.
A word of caution is necessary. To speak of the vari
eties of design is not to call for the lot of them to be
thrown at the modern m u s e u m . With overstimulation,
the palate becomes jaded: excessive lighting and too
l8 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
m a n y options weary visitors rather than entice them.
There is, moreover, a need for non-demanding spaces
within the m u s e u m complex. O n e of the successful
features of m a n y world m u s e u m s are these places with
out display, places which attest to the truest sort of
diversity, where people move under no protocol other
than their o w n freedom to meet and mingle, relax and
contemplate.
Design meets diversity with rich results in the idea
of the meeting place. Instead of being channelled d o w n
corridors in a fixed sequence of predetermined experi
ences, visitors are led to the heart of a culture: its peo
ple. A n d what better design symbol for the m u s e u m
itself which is so m u c h the meeting of peoples? In the
Tehran M u s e u m of Contemporary Art, a large atrium
in the centre draws on the idea of the traditional small
pool, the hoze, a symbol at once domestically simple
and socially profound. At Te Papa in Wellington , there
is a waharoa or gateway in the marae (the traditional
Maori meeting place) where visitors await their hosts. It
is the threshold between guest and host, manuhiri and
tangata whenua, and it celebrates the meeting of cul
tures. Ask anyone in Wellington and they will confirm
that this is no empty symbol. Te Papa itself as a whole
is just such a meeting place, where people are as likely
to be enticed into an exhibit on their way to dinner in
one of its restaurants as they are to be drawn to its non-
display spaces to take in what they've seen. The spirit
of the design has imbued the building with its intended
Maori welcome.
Meeting places assure us that such buildings are
about people. Moreover they are not neutral or empty
spaces. They are defining presences that confirm that
communities are not locked up in m u s e u m displays,
but have real thriving complex modern-day lives. It is
important that m u s e u m s are designed to create such
presence rather than offering an empty vault into which
diversity m a y softly creep. W h e n the M u s e u m of Lon
don programmed its groundbreaking Peopling of Lon
don exhibition in the early 1990s, it deliberately broke
its longstanding policy of apparent political neutrality
(the old m u s e u m way) in order to present a particular
anti-racist view of the issue of immigration to the capi
tal.21 There was no pure London "prior" to immigration.
The very essence of the city comprised 15,000 years of
"peopling" one resting place along the Thames valley.
The argument wasn't about diversity: it took hold of it
in order to be diverse, to speak not only of the past, but
of h o w w e live now.
The exhibition offers an important instance of h o w
m u s e u m s can turn representation into celebration.
" A fundamental objective of the project . . . became
to challenge the view that post-war immigration in
London was a recent 'problem' by turning this argu
ment on its head and celebrating the diversity of
London's people since prehistoric times".22
It's a basic shift in attitude that ensures that diversity is
a kind of inclusive welcome - rather like the meeting
spaces described above - not just a show of 'otherness'
which risks an old-style attitude of intriguing exoticism.
Consultation has shown that m a n y cultural groups wish
museums to adopt a more celebratory approach to their
culture, to enliven and cherish it rather than describe it.
More politically, if one is to strive against negative cul
tural associations in the media, a more positive outlook
can do a lot of good. It m a y at times be necessary in
order to counteract the weight of opinion visitors m a y
bring.23 A n d again, as Te Papa and other museums show,
such a positive view is not about fanfare and applause. In
the Roturua M u s e u m of Art and History in N e w Zealand,
a bowl of water is set outside the entrance to the Maori
galleries to enable visitors to conduct ritual washing after
their close contact with the powerful taonga. It's a simple
Ivy, R. (2001) "Foreword" In W . Preiser & E, Ostroff (Eds.) Universal Design Handbook. N e w
York: McGraw-Hill, p.3
Resource: The Council for Museums, Archives and Libraries, Renaissance News 1 (August
2003).
19
Svetlana Alpers, "The Museum as a Way of Seeing" in I. Karp 8c S. Lavine, (Eds.) Op.cit.,
p. 29.
Lighting is often a 'late' aspect of public design but should be planned in from the start.
For thoughts on the impact of lighting in museums, see Ernest Wotton, Let there be light
(Canadian Museums Association).
See Nick Merriman ( 1997 ) "The Peopling of london Project". In E. Hooper-Greenhill (Ed.)
Op.cit., pp.119-148
2 2 ibid, pp. 121-122
2 3 See Hooper-Greenhill (1997) Op.cit., p. 9 and Sam Walker (1997) "Black Cultural Muse
ums in Britain"In Hooper-Greenhill (Ed.) Op.cit., pp.32-49. The notion of white media
expertise on life in Africa is examined for its stereotypical effects on the understanding
of black culture, an important analogy for how museum authorities 'speak' on behalf of
other cultures.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 19
placement of Maori culture in a shared, rather than an
objective, form and one which proves Michael Baxan-
dall's point that ultimately "exhibitors cannot represent
cultures. Exhibitors can be tactful and stimulating impre
sarios . . . exhibition is a social occasion".24 The Roturua
bowl is both presentation and participation. If m u s e u m
diversity is to thrive, it needs to acknowledge that every
label that's written, every object that's conserved, every
display and public space that's designed, is a welcome for
all people and a cause for celebration.
N e w technologies
In Whose Muse?, a recent collection of essays edited by
James Cuno , several leading m u s e u m directors inveigh
against an excess of m u s e u m gadgetry.25 Inclusiveness,
several of them argue, is a function of challenging peo
ple and giving them something new, improving them
rather than tacitly (and not so tacitly) appeasing their
instinct for easy entertainment. They may, of course,
be right. The dizzying array that is merely entertaining
is design with no useful purpose, an overlaying instead
of an interaction. James Fenton, examining the book in
the Guardian, described his horror at entering a m u s e u m
"bristling with video screens" where the objects "were
n o w competing with noisy looped messages".26
But where practice m a y fail on occasion, the point
surely is not to react against n e w technologies them
selves. W h a t James Fenton finds noisy, others might
well be able to integrate and enjoy. Instead of detracting
from the m u s e u m experience, technology m a y enhance
it. M u s e u m s have not moved very far if they continue
to see technology in competition with the objects. The
very division between static objects and moving display
feels old-fashioned, and m a y not accurately describe
the way younger visitors perceive the space, or those
for w h o m speed and sound are an environmental norm.
Well designed, n e w technologies can work wonders for
the wonders on display.
In practice, n e w technologies will be essential in
meeting 21st-century demands of access and diversity.
Events such as Telecom World - the next will take place
in H o n g Kong in 2006 - attract visitors from around
the globe. The n e w National M u s e u m of the American
Indian will incorporate state-of-the-art technology by
wiring the building with over 400 multiple c o m m u
nications systems outlets run from a central network
communication centre. From computer points to video
screens, n e w media is one of the greatest tools w e have
to ensure the continuing relevance of our displays.
But a paean to n e w media isn't enough. If we're to
use it, and avoid criticism that it is merely otiose or a
passing trend, w e need to understand precisely what it
is we're doing with it. A very specific area where tech
nology can be used is that of language. The language
issue is a key one for m u s e u m s . At one end, there is the
question of authority and the care required in choos
ing words "to tell other people's stories".27 At the other
is the practical issue of addressing visitors in their o w n
tongues. The Peopling of London exhibition, in trying to
draw visitors from the n e w communities it was in part
depicting, produced its material not in the standard set
of European languages, but London's eight most-spo
ken languages of the time, including Hindi, Gujarati,
Arabic, Chinese and Urdu. These days, the possibilities
of such multiple address are flourishing, from polyglot
audio-tours to smartcards that could trigger - were w e
bold enough to use them - tours and text displays in any
number of languages and levels. The initial costs m a y
seem exorbitant, but as a long-term strategy, and one
with significant cultural effect, the investment makes
sense. If w e are committed to telling not one but several
stories, w e should use technology's cutting-edge to push
the boundaries of just h o w m a n y stories w e can tell.
More broadly, whether it's easily altered lighting
or precisely variable n e w media points, what diversity
requires of design is flexible buildings. It's not that the
building must be a mere empty shell that cannot m a k e
a statement. It's that what's said needs to be inclusive to
all, not just the cognoscenti or the privileged few. A flex
ible space is not an empty one; it's one where the c o m
ponent parts create something momentous that allows
for change, that isn't reliant on a single fixed configura
tion for its effect. In Langa, the oldest township in Cape
T o w n , Guga S'thebe is an art complex built as just such a
flexible space: it has display areas, workshops, a concert
and theatre space. Its style is both eclectic and definably
African, and its appearance is set both apart and within
its surroundings. It is a place of community, as m u c h
20 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
as any hospital or school, a cultural centre that achieves
one form of popular reconciliation. The Smithsonian's
National M u s e u m of the American Indian effects a sim
ilar achievement. As its director Richard West has said,
"The creation of this m u s e u m signifies a m o m e n t in the
history of the Americas when w e are finally coming to
terms with our c o m m o n past".2"
Describing the variables of international m u s e u m
display, Masao Yamaguchi writes that "the space called
the ' m u s e u m ' refused from the very beginning to admit
the smells and sounds of everyday life".2' N e w spaces
such as Guga S'thebe or the Itau Cultural in Brazil can
at last refute that, and insist that the living presence of
their people m a k e up their physical and active identities.
There is a lesson perhaps in the complexity of interna
tional representation to remind us of the task ahead,
of the rewards and difficulties of designing for diverse
communities. Looking at the relationship objects have
in both the visible and invisible dimensions of the world,
Yamaguchi notes that:
"Japanese culture developed techniques of display that
were intended to make the invisible aspects of mono
visible by means of materialized mono. Put another
way, w e can say that these techniques were used to
demonstrate the chain of possible events by which
the material world is constituted. This involves a dia
lectic whereby the visible emerges out of the invisible
background that surrounds an object".30
Such techniques are rarely shared, it seems, though these
and a wealth of other design ideas can become part of a
global project if w e are willing to adapt and enrich our
o w n museums. Yet they are not, as the example shows,
easily imported without understanding the meanings
and ways of thought behind them. Design and diversity
are not so m u c h about display as about h o w different
communities experience the world and h o w they think.
Hearing h o w they speak m a y teach us h o w to listen. " Baxandall, M . (1991) "Exhibiting Intention". In I. Karp & S. Lavine (Eds.) Op.cit., p.41
Cuno, J. (Ed.) (2004)Whose Muse? Art Museums and the Public Trust, Princeton, N.J.: Prin
ceton University Press
Fenton, J. (2004) "Keeping the Bull Out of the China Shop". In The Guardian, 7 February
2004
2 / Coxall, H . (1997) "Speaking Other Voices". In E. Hooper-Greenhill (Ed.) Op.cit., p.100
Quoted in Toronto Star. 7 August 2004.
Yamaguchi, M . (1991) "Exhibition in Japanese Culture". In I. Karp & S . Lavine (Eds.) Op.cit.,
p.60
ibrd, p.62
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «•- MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 21
CHAPTER 1
Introduction A n d Overview
Katherine Goodnow
CH A N G E C A N OCCURbywayofsimpledrift.lt
can also occur when the usual patterns - the usual
narratives or practices - are shaken, questioned, resisted,
challenged: "that's not the way it was, you've left out the
important people", "that's not what we're like, that's m y
story and I claim the right to tell it", "that should be m y
decision".
Both kinds of change are of interest in the areas
k n o w n as media studies, narrative studies, or cultural
studies. This book, however, focuses on occasions of
the shaking kind. To do so, it turns to two countries
marked by challenges to established patterns: South
Africa and Australia. It turns also to places that m a y
seem at first unlikely sites for challenge and change: to
m u s e u m s in their several forms- natural history muse
u m s , historic sites, art galleries.
W h y turn in these directions? A n emphasis on
change in relation to challenge rather than simple drift
m a y come as no surprise. It has a clear fit with views
of society as always marked by contest between compet
ing forms of understanding or practice.1 In any society,
for example, there is usually more than one form of
medicine, religion, schooling, art, literature or political
party, more than one faction within a party, more than
one holder of power. In any society also, there is inevi
tably some degree of tension or competition a m o n g
the alternatives allowed, with variations in the sites of
particular tension, the targets chosen for objection or
challenge, the means used for maintaining privilege or
for seeking a shift in the status quo, and the forms of
change, accommodation or resistance that occur in the
face of challenge. The interesting and unfinished ques
tions then revolve around ways of specifying variations
in these aspects of challenge and change, together with
the circumstances that prompt their taking some forms
rather than others. Under what circumstances, to take
just one aspect, is a distinction between 'us' and 'them'
expressed - within m u s e u m s or in a society generally -
by physical separation, by seeking to m a k e 'them' invis
ible, or by representing 'them' as the epitome of every
thing that is 'simple', 'primitive', 'rough' or 'crude'?
Choosing nations such as South Africa and Australia
m a y also seem intuitively reasonable. To gain any rich
sense of challenge and change, w e need to look closely
at some specific cases, to build up a set of examples that
will serve a double purpose. They will help us build a
general picture, bringing out variations and consisten
cies in what is objected to and in the ways that protest
is met. They will also provide a resource for others w h o
are facing the need to change and can benefit from see
ing what has happened elsewhere, noting both what
might be adapted and what might be best avoided.
For both purposes, South Africa and Australia offer
a mix of similarities and differences that is likely to be a
rewarding base. They are both, for example, 'post-colo
nial' nation-states, marked by contests over versions of
history, the ownership of land, the grouping of people
into categories such as 'black' or 'white', and the rep-
22 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
resentation of 'self and 'other' in areas ranging from
art to politics. They are also countries where these sev
eral challenges and changes are occurring so recently -
and are still so ongoing - that there is the opportunity
to observe h o w they are unfolding, to interview peo
ple directly involved, and to ask h o w challenges and
changes are experienced. There are available then both
recorded and personal accounts of events. At the same
time, there are differences between the two countries
(political and demographic differences, for example)
that m e a n the forms of challenge and change w e observe
in one country will not simply be repeated as w e m o v e
from one to the other.
But museums? W e are accustomed by n o w to the idea
of challenges to history as written, with attention drawn
to biased accounts and to excluded or marginalised peo
ple (women, dissenters, and the 'little people', for exam
ple).2 W e are also becoming accustomed to the idea that
accounts presented by w a y of film are constructed and
always partial, whatever their form (Visual anthropol
ogy', fictional drama, or documentaries) and regardless
of w h o makes them.3 W h e r e film is concerned, w e are
also becoming accustomed to the idea that what w e see
is the result of negotiations a m o n g several interested
parties - original author, script-writers, producer, direc
tor, studio houses, distributors - rather than the result
of some gentle consensus as to what is 'best'.4
M u s e u m s , however, m a y not at first appear to be
marked by challenge or change. In the public eye, they
m a y stand out as unchanging - as stable or static bas
tions of truth and expert judgments. In reality, m u s
e u m s are changing in a variety of ways - changing in
what they display and h o w they display it, taking a sec
ond look at their roles or functions, asking questions
about h o w best to proceed in the face of shifting cir
cumstances.5
Those changes, however, might be seen - again in the
public eye - as stemming from circumstances such as
n e w acquisitions, a landmark building, concerns about
budgets, or simply the nature of m u s e u m visitors. H o w
can m u s e u m s be prompted by challenge and protest
w h e n what they offer are 'facts' and 'expert judgments'?
In reality, m u s e u m s offer more than facts and expert
judgments. They present, for example, some particu
lar views of people. They place people in an historical
frame, and sometimes 'freeze' them in some evolution
ary sequence. Here are people, they say or imply, w h o
were - or still are - simple in action, religion, problem-
solving, or artistic expression. Here is 'a dying race',
here a group that is 'progressing'. Here are people w h o
were 'great' or 'typical', and these were their lives. Here
are stories of discovery, conquest, loss. Here is 'art'.
Here, in contrast, are the 'collectables', the 'trophies',
the 'crafts' or the 'curiosities'.
Those assertions of significance or value m a y lead to
m u s e u m s becoming, not irrelevant to social change, but
sites of protest in themselves. They m a y be specifically
chosen for shaking, if only because they are perceived
as offering the 'authenticated' versions and judgements
that buttress a social status quo. The experts themselves
- not always in agreement with one another - m a y also
encourage m u s e u m visitors to look critically at what
is being presented to them, learning from the past and
asking what m a y still be biased or incomplete in what
they see.
Those opening comments set the stage for what this
book covers. The remainder of this chapter expands
on the opening comments , outlines the sequence and
structure of chapters, and introduces the methods and
guiding concepts adopted. I begin by adding some
detail to the reasons for the choice of places, m u s e u m s
in general, m u s e u m s of several kinds, and a combina
tion of approaches to the description and analysis of
each of the selected m u s e u m s .
W h y South Africa and Australia?
W h y Cape Town and Sydney?
These two nations, I propose, offer a productive combi
nation of similarities and differences. To start with one
large similarity, both countries started as colonies. Both
also m o v e d toward establishing m u s e u m s in the early
1800's, often with the aim of changing some local cir
cumstances (establishing a colonial identity, signalling a
civilised status, educating members of their o w n group
and of feeding materials back to 'mother-institutions').
Currently, both countries show a rise of calls for
change in the directions of 'reconciliation', 'inclusive-
ness', 'nation-building' and 'partnership'. These large
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 23
aims have m a n y meanings. In both cases, w e need to
k n o w more exactly what they cover and h o w far these
meanings are shared. C o m m o n to them all, at least, is
an implied revision of some old distinctions between
'self and 'other', and a recasting of old stories in ways
that several groups can find tolerable. Those w h o were
'colonised', for example, seek to tell their o w n stories
and to have brought into the open the 'bleaker' side of
glorified colonial achievements. Those w h o were 'colo
nisers' seek to retain some of the glory of their place in
the established narratives while acknowledging the sig
nificance of the other and the harms done to them.
In these respects, both countries fit Mclntyre and
Wehner's c o m m e n t on "all post-colonial nation-states".
All " n o w grapple with h o w to present a national cultural
narrative that can acknowledge the often unjust condi
tions of the past and build new senses of accommoda
tion, cohesion and reconciliation which look to the
future".6 They do so, moreover, at a time when "grand
national narratives" are themselves challenged by a ris
ing interest in the histories of smaller groups7, and when
there is far less faith than before in the judgements and
histories offered by some earlier experts. Anthropology,
Tomaselli suggests, has suffered especially. Post-colonial
times have "clipped the discipline's authority in defin
ing the non-Western Other . . . and seriously questioned
claims of anthropological neutrality".8
Those comments m a y make it sound as if challenge
and change in these two countries will be confined to
contests and negotiations between representatives of the
'colonisers' and the 'colonised', and will be restricted to
arguments about w h o has the 'true' version of history.
The m u s e u m s in both countries quickly make it clear
that this is not the case. They bring out first of all a var
iety of participants. Here are contests between m u s e u m
professionals and supporting bodies (from government
departments to Friends of The M u s e u m and tourist
organizations eager to see m u s e u m s meet the expecta
tions of their clients). Here are as well contests among
the professionals in several disciplines (one section of a
m u s e u m pulling against another, professionals 'outside'
objecting to the actions of m u s e u m staff). In both coun
tries also, the debates are more than arguments about
establishing history. They focus as well on methods of
collection and display, issues of consultation, access and
participation, and the functions of m u s e u m s .
Similarities alone, however, are not all w e need in
order to move toward a closer understanding of chal
lenge and change, either in a country at large or within
m u s e u m s . W e need as well differences likely to influ
ence the targets of protest, the forms of challenge, and
the forms of change. Even without close inspection,
South Africa and Australia present some promising
differences. In South Africa, for example, the group
that once was 'colonised' was always in the numerical
majority and n o w holds political control. In contrast,
the indigenous people in Australia, m a d e up of Austra
lian Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders, have been
for some time a numerical minority (they are currently
estimated to be around 2 % of the country's popula
tion'). They also hold little direct political power in
the sense of being any sizeable number of elected m e m
bers of government. W h a t they present, however, is an
increasingly recognised challenge to earlier versions of
Australian history and identity, together with a moral
call to considerations of justice.
Differences of those kinds should influence the forms
of challenge and change. In South Africa, for example,
the party that once held little direct political power is
n o w in a position to insist on changes in the established
narratives, and it has done so, with m u s e u m s singled
out as one of the institutions expected to change. In this
sense, South Africa is ahead of m a n y European coun
tries with legislation that enforces diversity also within
cultural institutions. Similarly, in Australia, the chal
lenges and the calls for change need to follow a different
route: to be, for example, more calls to conscience and
issues of reputation than government imperatives. The
interesting questions, when it comes to m u s e u m s , are
then the ways in which those different circumstances
influence the moves made toward aims such as 'inclu-
siveness' or 'reconciliation'.
There are as well differences in the circumstances
and timing of change. South Africa is recovering from
a period of greater internal upheaval and international
isolation than was the case in Australia. Australian
m u s e u m s had then the chance to begin moves towards
change somewhat earlier. That difference offers all the
more opportunity to ask what forms of contest and
change are readily made , are slow to appear, and tend to
24 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
last or disappear.
A n d the reasons for choosing Cape Town and Sydney7.
These are not the only large cities in the two countries,
and the museums within them are by no means the
countries' only museums . Historically, however, these
are the 'first cities' in each country: places where issues
of governance and 'first encounters' have a particular
prominence. They have both been legislative capitals
and perceived by m a n y as capital cities. They have also
both undergone profound change politically and d e m o -
graphically.
Cape T o w n and Sydney contain as well examples of
all three of the types of m u s e u m needed as a base for
moving toward an understanding of challenge and
change: art galleries, historic sites, and natural his
tory museums . There are fortunately sources to which
the reader m a y turn for accounts of m u s e u m s outside
these two cities.10 The range within the two cities, and
the presence again of similarities despite their being in
different countries, however, makes them a strong first
choice for moving toward the specification of challenge
and change in the face of varying circumstances.
Why Museums?
W h y pay any special attention to museums? They are
surely only one of several forms of media, one way
of conveying 'facts' or 'fictions', one way of achieving
national, commercial, or visibility goals. They m a y even
seem less worthy of attention than other forms. Their
functions as educators m a y be seen as taken over by
school systems and public broadcasters. As sites of week
end entertainment, they have long been surpassed by
cinema complexes.
For the m o m e n t , I single out two reasons. O n e is that
a focus on m u s e u m s does not m e a n ignoring other
media. In fact, museums highlight interconnections
among media that can add to analyses of challenge and
change in any form. The other reason is that m u s e u m s
illustrate a variety of aspects to challenge and change.
The aspects of challenge, for example, include both
general sources of concern and iconic cases: cases that
somehow concretise or embody general concerns and
capture attention. The aspects of change include shifts
in expected functions, audiences, and practices (from
methods of display to methods of decision-making).
M u s e u m s and other media. A focus on museums does
not mean that other media cease to be of interest. M u s
eums do not exist in isolation from other media (they
influence one another), and there are cross-cutting
issues. As one example, take the expected function of
nation-building. For museums, this function has been
noted as starting in Europe in the nineteenth century.
Before then, the 'mouseion' was more a space filled with
objects for the private viewing of kings or barons. Public
museums began with a decline in the power of the aris
tocracy and the rise of interest in finding ways "through
which a national citizenry might be moulded into a dis
tinct coherent community".11
See, for example, Bakhtin, M . (1981) The Dialogical Imagination: Four Essays. Austin:
University of Texas Press and D'Andrade, R . G . and Strauss, C . (1992) (Eds.) Human
Motives and Cultural Models. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
See, for example, Lowenthal, D . (2001) "National Museums and Historical Truth". In Mclntyre,
D . and Wehner, K . (2001) National Museums: Negotiating Histories. Conference Proceedings.
Canberra: National Museum of Australia.
See, for example, with regard to Australian media Langton, M . (1993) Well, I Heard it on
the Radio and I Saw it on the Television. Sydney: Australian Film Commission. For South
African cinema see, for example, Tomaselli, K . G . (1996) Appropriating Images: The
Semiotics of Visual Representation. Hojbjerg: Intervention Press. For a broader discussion on
documentary see, for example, Bruzzi, S. ( 20001 New Documentary: A Critical Introduction.
London: Routledge.
4 See, for example, Gledhill, C . (1988) "Pleasurable Negotiations". In Pribham, D . (Ed.) (1988)
Female Spectators: Looking at Film and Television. London: Verso.
See, for example, Hooper-Greenhill, E. ( 1994) Museums and Their Visitors. London: Routledge.
Also Mclntyre, D . and Wehner, K . (Eds.) (2001) National Museums: Negotiating Histories.
Op.cit.
6 Mclntyre, D . and Wehner, K . (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit., p.xv.
Lowenthal, D . (2001) "National Museums and Historical Truth". Op.cit., p. 158.
8 Tomaselli, K . G . ( 1996) Op.cit, p. 265.
The term "Torres Strait Islander" may not be familiar. It refers to people from islands off the
north-east coast. Long perceived as simply part of the "black" or "native" population, they
are now recognised as distinct from Aboriginals on the mainland, not only in language but
also in customs and belief systems. That recognition is now embodied in names such as
ATSIC: The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission established in 1990.
For one source of some other museums in South Africa, see Mclntyre, D . and Wehner, K .
(Eds.) (2001 ) National Museums: Negotiating Histories. Op.cit. The relevant chapters are by
Udo S. Kûsel and Rooksana Omar. See also Patricia Davison ( 1998) "Museums and the Re
shaping of Memory". In Nutall, S. and Coetzee, C (Eds). Negotiating the Past: The Making of
Memory in South Africa pp. 143-160. Oxford: Oxford University Press. For one brief source
on another Australian museum, see Casey, D . (2001) "The National Museum of Australia:
Exploring the Past, Illuminating the Present and Imagining the Future". In Mclntyre, D . and
Wehner, K . (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit. (Dawn Casey was the Director of the National Museum of
Australia, sited in the Federal Capital - Canberra - and opened in 2001 ).
Mclntyre, D . and Wehner, K . (2001) refer here to arguments presented by David Lowenthal
in National Museums: Negotiating Histories. Op.cit. p.xiv.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 25
Nation-building, however, is a function also often
expected of other media. It is expected, for example,
of public broadcasting systems and of national cinema.
Ellis, for instance, has brought out the ways in which
public broadcasting in Britain aimed to develop an
inclusive sense of nation.12 In similar vein, Morley sees
all media as aiming to convert "the masses into a peo
ple and the people into a nation" through the creation
of "a past in c o m m o n to the members of its audience".13
C o m m o n also is likely to be a particular difficulty when
it comes to nation-building. This is the difficulty of
finding effective ways of broadening the people repre
sented or changing the stories told without creating n e w
problems. To take two difficulties singled out by Lang-
ton for moves toward the inclusion of Australian A b o
riginals in film narratives: H o w do w e move forward
without essentialising people in n e w forms - without
presenting them, for instance, only as victims or only as
resistant heroes? H o w do w e recognise c o m m o n ground
but at the same time acknowledge and respect differ
ences, respect the fact that " w e are not all the same as
one another?"14
Recognising these communalities, and asking h o w
they are played out in both m u s e u m s and other media,
is one way of adding to analyses of challenge and change.
Useful also is the recognition that the people participat
ing in challenge and change are often aware of what is
happening in other media. W h a t happens in film and
television, for example, shapes their expectations as to
what is right, reasonable, or possible. M u s e u m s then, as
they contemplate change or resistance to change, m a y
do well to see what is happening elsewhere and to con
sider those events as a base for anticipating challenges
or for borrowing a practice already found feasible.
M u s e u m s as illustrating several aspects of challenge
and change. M u s e u m s are areas where a first ques
tion has to do with whether change is really occurring:
whether changes are more "rhetoric" than "reality".15
For specific areas where change has occurred or
might occur, the possibilities are several. To start with,
challenges and changes m a y be looked for in the area
of expected functions. O n e expected function for pub
lic m u s e u m s , for example, has long been education and
the advancing of knowledge. That expectation, however,
has to be set against the competing interests and oppor
tunities of the hoped-for audiences. As Graeme Davison
points out, this is not a n e w aspect of challenge:
"The democratic revolutions of the late eighteenth
century, beginning with the French Revolution,
transferred these emblems of kingly power to the
people .... Democratic leaders .. . saw the m u s e u m as
a means of civilising - that is, creating civic virtue -
among their n e w supporters. The m u s e u m was a kind
of people's palace, modelled architecturally on the
homes of princes, filled with the trophies of national
conquest but patronised by the people .... As the
n a m e itself suggests, it was a place for musing rather
than amusing, for education rather than entertain
ment. It competed for the attention of the working
m a n and w o m a n with other sorts of less improving
shows: the circus, the waxworks, the cyclorama, the
peepshow and the freak-show. These more plebeian
exhibits celebrated the freakish, the sensational and
the grotesque: the m u s e u m by contrast was organised
around formalised notions of style, chronological
sequence, and typology".16
The current times m a y have sharpened the competition
for audiences and the need to combine 'education' and
'entertainment'. Both in the past and the present, however,
expected functions are certainly one area in which to look
for the forms that challenges and changes m a y take.
A second area highlighted by m u s e u m s has to do
with narratives and audiences. Traditionally, m u s e u m s
display objects of conquest, discovery, and selective
glory. The 'other' appears predominantly as the object of
study, less important than the conqueror, the discoverer,
or the portrait-maker. W h a t happens then when audi
ences change, especially in the direction of audiences
w h o were once only 'objects of study'? D o they question
or reject the stories told rather than accept them? D o
they insist on the tales of conquest and discovery being
changed? Changed, for example, to include accounts
of land that was not simply 'settled' without resistance,
that was well-peopled rather than 'empty', and accounts
of people as far from 'primitive' in their art, their reli
gion, and their ways of life?
A third area has to do with the nature of practices.
26 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Most museums , for example, present their stories by
way of objects: Rock carvings, fossils, pots, buildings,
written texts, painted surfaces. These are the bases on
which, for example, the history of a people is usually
reconstructed. W h a t happens then when the demand
arises to work from other bases: to work, for example,
from intangible heritage - oral histories, songs, dances,
or the shape of ceremonies? W h a t happens also when
the n e w stories call for adding to a museum's existing
collections? Most mu s eu ms have a strong investment
in the objects and records they already have, and in
the design of their spaces and displays. Those spaces
m a y even be already 'full'. Making physical space for
new archival records and for the presentation of n e w
material - as well as finding room in one's budget for
the acquisition of n e w material - are special challenges
for established museums . Small wonder, as w e shall see
later, that some of them envy 'new m u s e u m s ' that start
without accumulated baggage.
M u s e u m practices cover as well ways of making deci
sions. Decisions typically involve people with often
diverse and compartmentalised interests. The work
itself, however, calls for cutting across disciplines. At
the n e w National M u s e u m of Australia, for example,
"curators ... with an environmental science background
work collaboratively with staff from the First Austral
ians Gallery, and curators trained in public history and
political history work closely with others w h o are expe
rienced in archaeological field work".17 O n e should not
expect that these collaborations will be without contest.
Within a m u s e u m , however, all the professionals
m a y be united in seeing the decisions as belonging to
them rather than to people w h o are not 'profession
als'. There is then a special sense of challenge when the
claim is made that the decisions should be made by 'the
community', that 'the community' should be consulted
before collection and display are decided upon, and
that even the rights of ownership do not reside in the
m u s e u m . M u s e u m s , to their surprise, m a y n o w face
claims of repatriation and return: familiar to them in
the case of highly public objects such as the Elgin M a r
bles but n o w extending to 'secret/sacred objects' and to
bodies or parts of bodies.
The final area highlighted by m u s e u m s as a promis
ing place in which to seek specific forms and circum
stances for challenge and change has to do with the pres
ence and nature of iconic cases. I take as an example for
the m o m e n t a case that featured the return of a body
from a m u s e u m for 'proper burial', and that involved
both street-level protest and high-level political negotia
tion. This body has been the subject of several reports.
(It will also re-appear in Chapter 3). I single out, h o w
ever, a report from a Sydney newspaper describing a
South African request for return that was successful
only in 2002.18
The body parts in question were of a young Khoi-San
w o m a n , Sarah Baartman, w h o came from the border
lands of the Eastern and Western Cape but moved to
Cape T o w n around 1810. Shortly after this, the article
reports, Baartman entered into a contract with a British
ship's doctor - William Dunlop - and left South Africa.
The contract led to her being put on display throughout
Europe as "a sexual freak", obliged to appear naked and
to walk, sit or stand so audiences could see "her pro
truding backside and large genital organs". In London,
the report notes, anti-slavery activists tried to stop the
show, but the courts found the contract valid.
Before her death in Europe in 1815, the article contin
ues, Baartman was written up by several scientists, w h o
saw her body as "proof of the superiority of the white
race". After her death, Napoleon Bonaparte's surgeon-
general, George Cuvier, made a plaster cast of her body
and put it, along with jars of her preserved body parts,
on display at the National Musée de l ' H o m m e in Paris.
Nelson Mandela raised the question of repatriation
of her remains with President Mitterand in 1995. Her
proper burial in South Africa was seen as a necessary
part of rebuilding self-respect, particularly for Khoi-San
South Africans. In 1996, South Africa's foreign minis
ter, the late Alfred Nzo , again raised the issue. Finally,
Ellis, J. (20001 Seeing Things: Television in the Age of Uncertainty. London: LB. Taurus.
In the first quote Morley is citing Martin-Barbero (1988). In the second the quote is from
Scannell (1989). Both are in Morley, D . (1992) Television Audiences and Cultural Studies
London: Routledge, p. 267.
1 4 Langton, M . (1993) Op.cit., p. 39.
Sandell, R. (2001) Rhetoric or Reality? Museums as Agents of Social Inclusion. Leicester:
Leicester University.
Davison, G . (2001 ) "National Museums in a Global Age: Observations Abroad and Reflections
at Home". In Mclntyre, D . and Wehner, K . (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit., pp.13-14.
1 7 Casey, D . (2001) Op.cit., p.5.
The Sydney Morning Herald - January 31, 2002.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY TJ
in January 2002, a bill was passed in the French Senate
to return her remains to South Africa. Members of the
Senate admitted that the remains had little scientific
value:
" H o w can w e let a body rot in the back rooms of some
m u s e u m for 25 years w h e n no researchers are the least
bit interested and her o w n people are clamouring for
her return?"19
M a n y South Africans, the Sydney report goes on to
note, saw the young w o m a n ' s story as "a metaphor for
what had happened in their country during centuries of
h u m a n conquest". There is, interestingly, no commen t
offered on parallel Australian cases of late and contested
repatriation (e.g. the skeletal parts of the 'last Tasmanian
Aboriginal' - Truganini). The repatriation of Baartman's
remains is presented in this Sydney newspaper as news
worthy but also as a purely South African 'metaphor'.
W h a t makes some displays or practices iconic - powerful
and attention-grabbing 'metaphors' in particular settings
or across settings - is as yet far from clear. Clear, however,
is the value of considering both iconic cases and general
concerns as areas in which to look for the specifics of
challenge and change.
Why Three Kinds of Museum?
It is possible to learn a great deal about challenge and
change by considering individual museums. 2 0 The oppor
tunities are increased, however, if w e look across several
m u s e u m s , with these covering more than one type.
M u s e u m s , however, m a y b e of m a n y kinds. For Kelly
and Gordon, for example:
"(T)he term ' m u s e u m ' covers cultural institutions
including natural history, general/social history
m u s e u m s , science centres, historic houses, art galler
ies, archives and libraries, Aboriginal Keeping Places/
Cultural Centres, as well as outdoor sites such as
historic parks, botanical gardens and national parks
which have exhibitions and displays that are visited
by the public".21
From a m o n g these m a n y possibilities, which would be
useful to choose? The three types selected for this 'case
book' are (1) natural history m u s e u m s that contained
'ethnographic' or 'cultural' sections, (2) historic sites, and
(3) art galleries. The bases for choice have to do with the
likelihood of these three bringing out various aspects
of challenge and change. More specifically, each brings
into prominence different views about the functions of
m u s e u m s and a variety of practices (I shall focus here
on practices that embody views about differences a m o n g
people). Each also highlights some particular aspects
of challenge and change that are likely to be relevant to
m a n y museums .
The m u s e u m s w e usually label as Natural History
m u s e u m s provide a starting point. They typically focus
on an evolutionary presentation of the past. Here are
dinosaur bones, fossils, stuffed animals that are exotic
or no longer to be found. Here also are often sections
devoted to the history of people: 'Early m a n ' , past civi
lisations (early Greeks and R o m a n s , for example), and
'the first people of this place' (the Indigenes as they
were). M u s e u m s of this type have long been expected
to serve as sites for education and research. They are
n o w often expected to serve as well the function of
promoting inclusiveness, with 'minorities' n o w given a
different place. The usual practices of these m u s e u m s ,
however, m a y present some particular difficulties. A
sharp divide between people, rather than an inclusive
togetherness, for example, can be implied by the plac
ing of the colonised 'other' in juxtaposition with non-
h u m a n aspects of exotica in the n e w world (its flora and
fauna), and by a concern with 'preserving their disap
pearing past', ignoring their current presence and posi
tion. Partly because of these practices - and because of
earlier methods of collection and an early breadth to
what were classed as 'objects' or 'curiosities' - these m u s
eums highlight some particular aspects of challenge and
change. These include, for example, the presentation
of people only as they were in 'the past', together with
definitions and decisions related to ownership, cultural
property, and repatriation.
The second type selected as a focus - Historic Sites
- also has attached to it the connotation of something
'old'. Historic sites or houses are par excellence ' m e m o r y
boxes', meant to serve as reminders of 'the way things
28 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
were'. The usual practices, however, m a y tidy up the
past, creating impressions that are all the more mislead
ing because the houses seem so 'authentic'. A n d again
the usual practices m a y perpetuate divisions among
people, promoting visibility for some but not for oth
ers. The grand farmhouse, for example, is saved, but not
the workers' cottages that were part of the original farm.
A m o n g the issues highlighted are some that appear also
with natural history m u s e u m s : the issue, for exam
ple, of the extent to which some people are invisible.
Highlighted n o w are also questions about the nature
of m e m o r y (how do these 'boxes' evoke memory?)
and decisions about what should be saved, restored, or
reconstructed. Should this house or site, for example, be
the house as it was found, even if that means presenting
only an archaeological dig? The house as it was, even if
that means borrowing from other sites? O r some n e w
structure that evokes a sense of what the original house
represented: a site, for example, of governance, of power,
or of dispossession?
Art Galleries form the third type selected. They
attract attention in part because they are historically
associated with a different function from those of other
museums . As D . F. Branagan notes,22 Italian noblemen
in the 16th century would often have a room within
the house in which older or exotic artefacts were gath
ered. This room was called the museo. A separate room
would include paintings and sculpture, and the n a m e
of this room - the galleria - was given a n a m e that had
fewer connotations of the old or exotic, or of contem
plative thought. The practices in these m u s e u m s m a y
appear to say less or imply less about divisions among
people. They do, however, signal w h o counts: These are
'important artists', these 'don't matter'. They also make
distinctions with regard to the value of various forms
of artwork. This is 'art', this is 'craft'. These works are
'high culture', these 'popular culture'. Raised again are
several of the issues raised by other m u s e u m s : H o w , for
example, to move toward inclusiveness in what is pre
sented or in the people w h o come to see what is on dis
play? That aim can present a special problem for places
like art galleries, perceived by m a n y as places geared
toward 'elite' or 'knowledgeable' people. Highlighted
as well is the need to break some traditional divisions
(divisions, for example, between 'art' and 'craft',
between 'high' and 'popular' culture) and the need, in
these post-colonial settings, to ask h o w Indigenous art
is treated. Is it, for example, valued, respected, appro
priated? If collected, is it treated in the same way as the
work of non-Indigenous artists? Is it, for example, hung
in a separate section, displayed in a different way, given
some special 'explanatory' texts? If the work is read as
both a visual pattern and an expression of culture, do
only members of that culture have the right to review or
to comment?
In short, here are three types of m u s e u m s that, even
in advance, hold promise as likely to bring out variety
in the decisions that m u s e u m s m a y face and in the prac
tices, meanings and expectations that m a y encourage or
constrain challenge and change.
Choosing Methods:
Ways of Studying Museums
There are several ways of studying museums . O n e is to
consider their history: their changing forms, functions,
and audiences. This kind of approach is already evident
in the material offered in this chapter. It is an approach
that brings out especially well the impact of particular
people and the rise of established views and ways of pro
ceeding that any attempt at change will need to take into
account.
A second approach looks at the physical quality and
the internal organisation of m u s e u m s . Physical qual
ity covers features such as the kind of building that a
m u s e u m occupies, the layout of its space, and the
impressions it makes on visitors. Internal organisation
covers features such as the ways in which departments
Senator About, reported in The Sydney Morning Herald, ibid.
20
Eileen Hooper-Greenhill's analysis of London's National Portrait Gallery is one example. It
is to be found in lohansen. A . , Losnedahl, K . G . , Âgotnes, H . (Eds.) (2002) Tingenes Tale:
Innspill til Museologi Bergen: Bergen Museum. The title of Hooper-Greenhill's chapter is:
"Critical Pedagogy in the Post-Museum". Several other examples, drawn from a variety of
countries, are to be found in the chapters edited by Mclntyre and Wehner (2001) Op.cit.
Kelly, L. and Gordon, P. (2001) "Developing a Community of Practice: Museums and
Reconciliation in Australia". In Sandell, R. (Ed.) Rhetoric or Reality? Museums as Agents of
Social Inclusion (p. 28 in pre-publication version). Leicester: Leicester University Press.
2 2 Branigan, D.F. (1979) "The Idea of a Museum". In Strahan, R. (Ed.) (1979) Rare and
Curious Specimens: An Illustrated History of the Australian Museum 1H27 -1979. Sydney: The
Australian Museum, p.l.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 29
are structured and h o w they function amongst t hem
selves.23 Are there, for example, separate sections such
as 'ethnography', 'African Art' or 'Aboriginal Art'? W h o
m a k e s decisions about various kinds of change? H o w are
the interests of the archaeologist linked to those of the
ethnographers, or the interests of the 'basic' scientists
combined with those of the staff w h o focus o n audience
research? A s in s o m e media studies - the study of films
especially - the focus of interest n o w becomes the nego
tiation of interests a m o n g several stakeholders.24
A third approach studies m u s e u m s from a c o m m u n i
cations perspective, building on S h a n n o n and Weaver's
m o d e l of communicat ion in the late 1960's.25 T h e m o d e l
was originally simple and in line with general U.S.-based
communicat ion theory of the time. T h e communicator
sends a message to the receiver and, provided that s o m e
shared knowledge exists between the two, the message
is received basically as it was sent. M u s e u m s analysis
added a concern with h o w the message was received
w h e n the message was m a d e up primarily of an object.
David C a m e r o n , for example, w a s concerned with situ
ations in which the exhibitor had knowledge that the
receiver did not, creating a need for aids (e.g. labels,
texts) to ensure the message w a s received in line with
the w a y it was sent and to avoid misinterpretations.26
M u s e u m environments were then considered in terms
of h o w far the environments created were received 'cor
rectly' by the audience. Design issues were studied pre
dominantly in relation to their educational value, with
value understood as clarity of message rather than the
promotion of interest in further learning.
A fourth approach looks at the m u s e u m as a scripted
space. This is the kind of approach that especially
invites comparisons m a d e to the narratives presented by
other media such as film, radio, or television, and that
often borrows questions from analyses of other media .
D a w n Casey, for example, borrows from written history
(in this case the history of the w a r in Vie tnam) a set of
questions to ask in relation to the recently-established
National M u s e u m of Australia. Those questions cover:
" H o w is the nation defined?
W h o should be told about its past?
W h o is included in the story, and h o w ?
W h o is excluded from it, and w h y ?
H o w does local experience fit into the national nar
rative?
W h a t happens w h e n the c o m m u n i t y that w e call
nation does not fully m e s h with the territorial entity
that w e call country?"27
Narrative approaches also p rompt attention to the
assumptions of the narrators. To borrow a statement
from Tomaselli's analysis of "visual anthropology", ques
tions need to be asked about "the ideological, cultural,
political and psychoanalytic assumptions of their m a k
ers" and "their relationships to the p h e n o m e n a that they
record", "undoing the assumption that the record shows
'truth' in all its visible clarity".28
Underlined as well by a narrative approach are the
political and social contexts in which m u s e u m s func
tion and issues of representation and access. In M c l n -
tyre and Wehner ' s description, " n e w museology":
"gave primacy to issues of representation and access.
It called for m u s e u m s to ensure that their practice
gave equitable representation to all sectors of society,
particularly those w h o by virtue of gender, race or
class had been traditionally excluded. M u s e u m s were
encouraged to b e c o m e m o r e welcoming, inclusive
and relevant to diverse social groups, and in s o m e
cases this impetus resulted in m o r e democratic poli
cies governing access, use and ownership of m u s e u m
collections".2'
T h e fifth and last approach consists of combining several
methods. Eileen Hooper-Greenhill, for example, c o m
bines a concern with the organisation of m u s e u m s and
a concern with the ways in which m u s e u m s c o m m u n i
cate. She adds to the simple communication mode l by
pointing out that m u s e u m s communicate by a variety
of m e a n s , over and above the objects displayed and the
individual exhibitions. This holistic approach includes
both o n - and off-site entities including the buildings,
publications, and staff. A further example of combined
approaches comes with attention to the development of
'communities of practice'. T h e term 'communities' refers
to the establishment of shared meanings and shared
ways of proceeding (from ways of indicating importance
to ways of resolving differences). T h e term 'practice' in
30 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION * MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
itself typically combines attention to place, the nature
of activities (e.g., their designation as 'play' or 'work', as
'art' or 'research'), the people involved, the nature of their
participation, and the meanings attached to each of these
features.30
Increasingly, accounts of m u s e u m s combine meth
ods. A combination of methods certainly marks
the account I shall offer. For the description of each
m u s e u m , for example, it pays attention to the m u s
eum's physical setting, its history, the people involved
in challenge and change, the nature of practices (from
methods of display to methods of decision-making),
and the meanings that m a y be placed on these several
features. As sources, it draws from direct observa
tion of displays, written records (labels, papers or w e b
sites), and interviews with people closely involved with
the development of the m u s e u m s considered. These
people are Patricia Davison, Marilyn Martin, Lalou
Meltzer, Carole Kaufmann and Nazeem Lowe in South
Africa and Phil Gordon, Peter White, Ken Watson and
Fabienne Virago in Australia. They are identified in
more detail in particular chapters. I a m also greatly
indebted to Jatti Bredekamp for reviewing the South
African sections of the manuscript.
As an advance note on method, it also needs to be
said that I start from a background in media and cul
tural studies, covering all forms of representation (film,
television, broadcasting, m u s e u m s ) . This is an area that,
especially in its analyses of film and television, contains
at its core analyses of cultural identities as multiple and
fluid,31 and communities as imagined.32 It contains also
an emphasis on the need to consider ways of "Unthink
ing Eurocentricism"33, the significance of multiple audi
ences and their active interpretations of what is pre
sented34, the ways in which several stakeholders negoti
ate what will be shown and h o w this comes about35, and
multiple functions (from persuasion and education to
pleasure and the encouragement of a willingness to pay
for more)36.
Central to the area of media and cultural studies
is also an active review of the conceptual bases to the
analyses of representations. The area has shifted, for
example, from regarding viewers as essentially passive
and homogenous receptors to regarding them as heter
ogeneous and as active and literate interpreters, appro-
priators, and users of what is shown37, from a primary
concern with the ethnography of the people being rep
resented to the ethnography of production38, and from
a view of media-related institutions as contributing to
the public sphere by informing and educating people to
one of doing so ideally by providing access, including
the voices of minorities, and engaging in some forms
of dialogue with them.39 In effect, media and cultural
studies in general provide a conceptual and methodo
logical source to be drawn upon as the chapters proceed.
As a final advance note on approach, I should put on
record a particular interest in the way 'strangers' of any
kind ('foreigners', 'aliens') are represented, and in the
work of Julia Kristeva. Kristeva has highlighted espe-
See, for example Miles, R.S. (1985) "Exhibitions: Management, for a Change". In Cosson,
N . (Ed.J The Management of Change in Museums. London: National Maritime Museum,
pp.31-33.
See, for example, Mulgan, G . ( 1997) "Television's Holy Grail: Seven Types of Quality". In Eide,
M . , Gentikow, B. andHelland. K. , (Eds.) Quality Television. Bergen: University of Bergen.
See Hooper-Greenhill, 1994, for a more detailed discussion of early museums analysis.
Hooper-Greenhill, E. (1994) Museums and Their Visitors. London: Routledge.
See, for example, Cameron (1968) "A Viewpoint: The Museum as a Communication System
and Implications for Museum Education". In Curator, 11 ( 1 ) p. 33 - 40.
'" Casey, D . (2001) Op.cit, p.5.
! S Tomaselli, K . G . (1996) Op.cit, p.162.
' Mclntyre, D . and Wehner, K . (2001) Op.cit., p.xv.
For Hooper-Greenhiirs modification of the earlier communications perspective, see Hooper-
Greenhill, E. ( 1994) O p clt. Attention to "communities of practice" is especially explicit
in a paper by Kelly and Gordon (2001) Op.cit. Kelly & Gordon, draw from Wenger, E.
(1998) Communities of Practice: Learning Meaning and Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press. For one introduction to the concept and the description of practices, see
Chaiklin, S. and Lave, J. ( Eds.) ( 1993 ) Understanding Practice: Perspectives on Activity and
Context. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (The description of practice is in itself
based on noting several features to any activity: the physical setting, the people involved,
the nature of their participation, and the meanings attached to these features.)
Barker, C (1999) Television, Globalization and Cultural Identities. Buckingham: Open
University Press.
Andersen, B. (1991 ) Imagined Communities. London: Verso.
Shohat, E. and Stain, R. (1994) Unthinking Eurocentrism, Multiculturahsm and the Media.
London: Routledge.
See for example Ang, I. (1996) Living Room Wars: Rethinking Media Audiences for a
Postmodern World. London and N e w York: Routledge. Or Gillespie, M . ( 1995 ) Public Secrets:
Eastenders and its Audience. London: British Film Institute.
See for example Schlesinger, P. and Morris, N . (1997) "Cultural Boundaries". In Media
Development. Vol XLIV 1/1997, pp. 3 - 44. This article can also be found at: www.wacc.org.
uk/publications/md/mdl997-l/schlesinger__morns.html.
See, for example Ellis, ). (2000) Seeing Things: Television ill the Age of Uncertainty. Op.cit.
See for example Martin-Barbero, J. ( 1993 ) Communication, Culture and Hegemony. London:
Sage.
Murdoch, G . (1993) "Authorship and Organisation". In Alvarado, M . , Buscombe, E. , and
Collins, R. (Eds.) The Screen Education Reader: Cinema, Television, Culture. London:
Macmillan, pp. 123-143.
Allen, S. ( 1999) News Culture. Buckingham and Philadelphia: Open University Press.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION n« MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 31
daily the mixture of connections between self and other
that strangers evoke: the combination of fascination and
rejection, the distancing of the other by designations
such as 'foreign', 'alien', 'primitive' or 'uncivilised', the
readiness to view the other as long as this can be done
safely, and the fear that the loss of borders and bounda
ries will m e a n an end to the stability of the social order
and of the sense of self.4" Both of these interests on m y
part are contained in two earlier pieces, one on Kristeva
in relation to film, and one on contrasts in newspaper
coverage, within Norway, of people labelled sometimes
as 'refugees', sometimes as 'economic migrants' w h o
have no claim on special status, and sometimes as peo
ple given 'temporary asylum' w h o n o w threaten to over
stay their expected visiting time.41 M u s e u m s are clearly
not the only sites in which some seek to maintain and
others to change the physical and social boundaries
between those defined as self and other. H o w that con
test is worked out in museums , however, needs to be
seen by considering the past and current features of
m u s e u m s themselves.
The Sequence and Structure
of Chapters
The chapter that follows this introduction (Chapter 2)
outlines the backdrop of events (political events espe
cially) that influenced features of all three types of
m u s e u m to be covered. The first half is concerned with
South Africa, the second with Australia. The chapter
serves two purposes. It allows background events spe
cific to each of the museums to be taken up in the chap
ters devoted especially to each. It also introduces some
critical stakeholders for all museums (the external bod
ies that play a funding, regulatory, or monitoring role),
and the concept of a watershed period: a period that
marked a change in circumstances for all the museums
in a country.
In South Africa, this watershed is set as 1994. That
year marked a major shift in political power, with Nel
son Mandela's release from prison and democratic
elections. It also marked the emergence of govern
ment statements to the effect that museums would
need to change the way they operated and the func
tions they served. The change should be in the direc
tion of increased access, inclusiveness (undoing Afri
kaner and European emphases), and contributions
to nation-building (both by recognising 'diversity in
unity' and by contributing to the nation's economy). In
Australia, the watershed is set as 1993. In that year, the
M u s e u m s Association of Australia issued a paper call
ing on m u s e u m s to work toward developing "new rela
tionships" with indigenous communities. The changes
should be again in the direction of reconciliation
and nation-building, marked especially by a stronger
recognition of Aboriginal cultural history and cultural
property, more extensive consultation, and an eye to
changing the knowledge and perceptions of m a n y non-
indigenous people.
Chapters 3 to 8 are then in pairs. Chapters 3 and 4
cover two m u s e u m s that are mixtures of 'natural his
tory' and 'cultural history'. These are the South African
M u s e u m in Cape T o w n (Chapter 3) and the Australian
M u s e u m in Sydney (Chapter 4). Chapters 5 and 6 cover
examples of historic sites. These are Groot Constan-
tia, the Castle and District Six M u s e u m in Cape T o w n
(Chapter 5)42 and, in Sydney, the M u s e u m of Sydney,
with its constant subheading: O n the Site of the First
Government House (Chapter 6). Chapters 7 and 8 con
sider two art galleries: the South African National Gal
lery in Cape T o w n (Chapter 7) and the Art Gallery of
N e w South Wales (Chapter 8).
In keeping with interest in the physical features of
museums , each of the m u s e u m chapters begins with a
'visitor's eye view' of the building, the arrangement of
spaces, and the overall impression that these features
make . That opening section is followed by historical
material, usually divided into three parts: one on 'back
ground and beginnings', one on 'the growth of collec
tions' up to the watershed period, and one on events
after that. In essence, this historical section brings out
the emergence of functions, administrative structures,
and practices that shape the forms taken by challenge
and the open-ness or resistance to change. The later
parts continue detailing forms of challenge and change,
with an emphasis on events leading up to or after events
in the 1990's.
Each of the m u s e u m chapters also ends by taking up
a particular issue that is highlighted by the m u s e u m or
32 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
museums considered but that is relevant to m a n y m u s
eums. These issues are noted here both for their gen
eral relevance and because they provide as well some
advance indication of what marks each chapter.
To start with Chapter 3 (focused on Cape Town's
South African M u s e u m ) , the highlighted issue concerns
an aspect of museums that seems especially to prompt
iconic cases of challenge and of slowness in change. This
is the presence of bodies or parts of bodies. The bod
ies in this case are part of a 'natural history' m u s e u m
with an 'ethnographic' section. Bodies emerge, again,
however, in Chapter 8, in the setting of an art gallery.
They are also part of protest and change in m a n y other
parts of the world, epitomised by the Native American
Grave Protection Act ( N A G P R A ) . The issue section of
Chapter 3 adds to that wider debate.
The issue highlighted at the end of Chapter 4
(focused on Sydney's Australian M u s e u m - more specif
ically its "First Australians" section) has to do with the
way challenges and changes appear in other media. Both
Chapters 3 and 4 offer a delineation of forms of chal
lenge protests that are likely to arise from Indigenous
groups, especially in relation to m u s e u m s with an ori
entation toward 'the past' and toward 'progress'. Other
media, however, can add to this specification. They also
exemplify challenges that m u s e u m s might anticipate
occurring in their o w n settings or forms of change that
they might borrow or adapt to fit their o w n circum
stances. The examples used as a base are from Aborigi
nal moves into film and television production (televi
sion especially). The general issue of linking m u s e u m
events to those in other media, however, is relevant to
m a n y kinds of m u s e u m s and m a n y countries.
In Chapter 5 (focused on some of Cape Town's his
toric sites), the highlighted issue has to do with making
explicit the concepts that underlie m u s e u m practices.
In this case, the general issue is exemplified especially
by accounts of h o w the District Six M u s e u m came to
take its shape. Here is an unusually explicit description
of h o w the museum's features reflected some particular
views of narrative, memory , and the need for the affect
ive engagement of visitors: views for which one might
n o w seek comparable accounts for other m u s e u m s or
use as a guide for analysing their practices.
Chapter 6 (focused on the relatively n e w M u s e u m of
Sydney) highlights a task faced by all museums . This
is the task of linking h o w they function to a variety of
audiences: audiences they already have or hope to attract
and that bring to m u s e u m s diverse background knowl
edge and expectations. The M u s e u m of Sydney was
from the start the object of great debate (mostly among
non-Indigenous groups) about the form it should take.
In the final section, the need for flexibility and change
in the face of diverse expectations is brought out espe
cially by the 'archived' state of some novel exhibitions
('audience resistance' is noted), the unexpected rise of
interest in educational programs for schools and their
pupils, and the continued presence of differences in
views - between Aboriginals and non-Aboriginals - with
regard to 'expertise' when it comes to aspects of Aborig
inal history or Aboriginal culture.
Chapter 7 (focused on The South African National
Gallery) highlights a feature of m u s e u m s that is a
frequent focus for challenge and change: the expected
functions of museums . M u s e u m s are n o w expected to
fill a variety of functions: from general education and
nation-building to entertainment, 'a little shopping',
and encouraging visitors to take a critical, questioning
view of what is being presented as 'fact' or 'significant'
work. These several functions and their compatibility
present a problem for museums . Their analysis, it is
proposed, m a y be helped by asking h o w other media -
television is taken as the prime example - dissect issues
of functions and practices. M u s e u m s , to repeat an argu
ment introduced in Chapter 4, do not exist in isolation
from other media. Specific points of interconnection,
however, are needed if w e are to take analysis beyond
such general statements. Analyses of functions and their
links to practices provide one such point.
Chapter 8 is the last of the chapters focused on spe
cific museums . The m u s e u m chosen for particular
attention is Sydney's Art Gallery: more specifically, the
See, for example. Kristeva, J. (1991) Strangers to Ourselves. N e w York: Columbia University
Press.
Goodnow, K . ( 1994) Kristeva in Focus: From Theory to Film Analysis. Bergen: Dept. of Media
Studies; and Goodnow, K . (1998) Norway: Refugee Policies, Media Representations. Bergen:
Dept. of Media Studies.
" Cape Town's most famous historic site - Robben Island - is not included as a case study as
it is well-documented elsewhere. See, for example, Robben Island's website: www.robben-
island.org.za or that of U N E S C O : whc.unesco.org/sites/916.htm.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION *+> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 33
Yiribana Gallery, devoted to Aboriginal art. All of the
m u s e u m s considered have brought out the significance
of the categorical divisions that are often embedded in
the work of m u s e u m s and the perceptions of their audi
ences. W e have seen, for example, divisions between
past and present, between 'white' and 'black', between
'natural history' and 'cultural history', between 'the
primitive' and 'the civilised', between 'art' and 'craft',
between what belongs in 'national' galleries and what
belongs in 'commercial' galleries, between what belongs
in general sections of a m u s e u m as against sections
marked as 'Indigenous' or - to use a Canadian term - as
'First Nations'. The issue section of Chapter 8 notes the
need for ways of looking at categorical divisions in gen
eral. The way chosen as an example is Kristeva's analy
sis of distinctions between 'us' and 'them', between 'self
and 'other': distinctions relevant to forms of both chal
lenge and change.
Chapter 9, to round out this overview of chapters,
contains no particular highlighted issue. It does, h o w
ever, continue the pervasive interest in cutting across
m u s e u m s and in building a general picture of con
test and change. It does so by asking especially where
one might next turn in order to add to what has been
learned from the museums so far considered. The chap
ter proposes some other nation-states and some other
m u s e u m s as illustrations of the bases that could be used
to guide further choices.
O n e last point about sequence and structure before w e
turn to the more detailed materai. The chapters build a
cumulative picture. The references, however, are self-
contained within each chapter. The reader can then
- in combination with this overview - read one chapter,
pairs of chapters for a particular type of m u s e u m , or the
triplets of chapters relevant to each country, followed by
the other 'bookend' chapter, Chapter 9, with its focus
on 'moving forward'.
34 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
CHAPTER 2
Across Museums: Shared Forms Of Challenge And Change
MU S E U M S M U S T B E expected to differ from one
another in the kinds of challenges they encounter
and the kinds of changes they exhibit. At the same time,
in any region there are likely to be circumstances that
prompt challenges and changes in m a n y of the museums
in that area. This chapter takes up those circumstances,
leaving to later chapters the events more specific to
particular museums. The chapter also introduces some
questions relevant to all museums: W h o makes the calls
for change? In what directions? By what means? With
what resources to make these changes happen? O n the
basis of what kinds of consultation or negotiation? To
what effect?
In both South Africa and Australia, the shared cir
cumstances of special interest are political change and
social transformation, directed toward altering the
Indigenous/non-indigenous divide. The labels for this
direction were often the same in both countries: recon
ciliation, nation-building, redress, increased represent
ation. M u s e u m s were, though somewhat more slowly,
a part of this direction for change, with gradual shifts
occurring in what was collected and h o w it was dis
played, the extent of consultation, the nature of staffing,
and the definitions of function, ownership, and cultural
property.
The ways in which those events unfolded, h o w
ever, were different in the two countries. The chapter
is accordingly divided into two parts. The first takes
up changes in South Africa, the second changes in
Australia. In both parts, the description is organised
around events before and after a time and an event
taken as a watershed for change.
In South Africa, the year for the chosen watershed
event is 1994. In that year, democratic elections were
held and Nelson Mandela, the head of the African
National Congress Party, became President. In the wake
of that change, a review of m u s e u m s that was prepared
in 1992 for the previous government was set aside. The
n e w directions for change were spelled out in a govern
ment White Paper in 1996. It called for n e w roles, a n e w
administrative structure to cut across museums , and
n e w funding arrangements. The issues emphasised
were those of access, redress, recognition of the coun
try's diverse peoples, and contributions to the country's
economic growth.
In Australia, the year for the chosen watershed event
is 1993. In that year, a paper was issued not by the gov
ernment but by the M u s e u m s Association. It called for
changes in m u s e u m practices with a particular empha
sis on issues of representation, ownership, and consul
tation. The title of the paper, Previous Possessions, New
Obligations, signals that emphasis. There were electoral
changes preceding this paper but not dictating it. The
year 1991 saw the election of a Labor Party govern
ment at the Commonweal th (Federal) level. That event
accelerated the changing recognition of the position of
Australian Aboriginals and the emergence of calls for
a change in the 'hearts and minds' of non-Indigenous
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 35
Australians. That event also made for some changes in
funding for the state-based museums . Commonweal th
funding could n o w be sought, for example, for the pro
vision of training and for advisors to Aboriginal c o m
munities, including arts advisors.
The singling out of watershed events does not mean
that contests or changes were absent before those events.
Nor does it m e a n that changes rolled out easily and
smoothly after them. The watershed times and events,
however, provide for each country a background frame
and a general timetable against which w e can begin
laying out several forms of challenge and change.
The next sections of this chapter consider the two
countries separately. The source materials - as in all chap
ters - are of several kinds: printed text, web-site mate
rials, and - for South Africa especially - policy papers
and interview comments.
South Africa
W h e n Mandela became President, he announced in his
inaugural address to Parliament that South Africa would
n o w become "a Rainbow Nation at peace with itself and
with the world".1
In essence, "becoming a Rainbow Nation" called for
diversity within a sense of national unity: for the accept
ance of differences, an end to discriminatory divi
sions by colour, and a wider distribution of goods and
privileges. "Being at peace with ourselves" called for an
acknowledgement of past wrongs and for their redress.
"Being at peace with the world" called for an end to cul
tural isolation and a new alignment with other coun
tries.
Those new directions might not seem to represent
anything specific to South Africa. A nation "at peace
with itself and the world", for example, might seem to
be what all nations hope for. The statement needs to be
considered, however, in the light of the conditions that
preceded it. Before the 1990s, as the world knows, diver
sity - at least diversity accompanied by any equality in
respect or privilege - was not a feature of South Africa.
Exclusion was made especially manifest in the form
of physical apartheid, with segregated areas for living
(White, Black, Coloured) and colour-coded government
departments. A department k n o w n as White O w n
Affairs, for example, came to administer the m u s e u m
named the Cultural History M u s e u m both in Pretoria
and Cape T o w n . In economic, social and political life,
and in all forms of creative expression, what was 'White'
or 'European' was privileged over what was 'African'.
Before 1994 also was a period in which protest was
actively and often brutally suppressed, when any gather
ing in apparent protest - by people of any colour - could
lead to police action. Before 1994 as well was a period
when, for m a n y of those growing up in South Africa,
the official histories and schoolbooks gave no visibility
to groups such as the African National Congress ( A N C )
or to any history other than White history. That kind of
wiping-out is not unique to South Africa. It is in m a n y
countries - including Australia - a way of attempting
to deny significance to a group. Its extent and shape in
South Africa are indicated by a personal comment from
Dr. Patricia Davison:
"What constituted history was really white history
and school textbooks reinforced that ... black peo
ple . . . would always be presented as if they weren't
as intelligent, they weren't as evolved in a sense ...
you got a very partial kind of representation of what
constituted South African history and virtually noth
ing on the history of African people Mandela's
name couldn't be printed in a book. You couldn't
have a picture of him, so he just wasn't there".2
Pre-1994: Some Preceding Forms of
Challenge and Change
The summary picture just presented m a y make it sound
as if 1994 represented a complete turn-around, with no
signs or seeds of change before then. Change, however,
did not come about that way, neither politically (1990,
for example, saw the release of Mandela and others from
a long period of prison on Robben Island) nor in m u s
eums.
I single out here only some of the changes at the
m u s e u m level. Several will appear also in the later
chapters on specific museums .
As a first sign of things beginning to move, I take an
invitation from the M u s e u m s Association to an African-
36 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <* MUSEUMS IN CAPE TOWN AND SYDNEY
American scholar, asking him to address a 1987 confer
ence. This was John Kinnard. Patricia Davison c o m
ments:
"The real wakeup call was in about 1987 when . . . John
Kinnard . . . a director at the Smithsonian Institute's
Anacostia M u s e u m , a Black American . . . came over
... to talk at a conference ... . At that time . . . politics
had spread. There was a lot of white opposition . . .
and people were really worried that the country was
going to end up in a more serious civil war. I mean ,
it was a civil war. There was a level of consciousness
and awareness, which there isn't at the m o m e n t , I
have to say ... this awareness that every single person
had some kind of role to play in this changing society
that w e were in. John Kinnard came along and he was
more than controversial. People got up and walked
out when he was talking. W e had the Administrator
of the Cape at the opening session ... he got up and
walked out, making a statement that when w e invite
people to come to our country, w e don't expect them
to criticise us etc. etc. . . . John Kinnard was saying
that basically m u s e u m s were staffed by white people,
white people make the collections, they mainly serve
white people, and if you want this to continue you're
going to find yourselves completely obsolete."
To that invitation, and the expectation that it would be a
"wake-up call", some further signs of change before 1994
m a y also be added.
• In a shift from the invisibility of recent African
political history, a 1992 exhibition dealt with Robben
Island, the site of imprisonment for Mandela and
m a n y other members of suppressed political parties.
The exhibition, organised by Davison and Andre
Odendaal, was presented at the Castle, a highly
symbolic historic building that had previously
marked the arrival of the Dutch and the significance of
military power. The existence of Robben Island was far
from unknown. A n exhibition presented in the heart
of Cape T o w n , however, meant that its presence and
significance were n o w underlined for South Africans
of all backgrounds. Robben Island n o w became part
of public history. (Chapter 5 provides more details on
the choice of the Castle as a site for marking challenge
and change. Robben Island, as mentioned in the
previous chapter, is already well discussed elsewhere
and is therefore not discussed in detail in this book).
• In a break from the privileging only of European
forms of art, the new Director of the National Gallery
(Marilyn Martin) set up in 1990 a Department of
African Art and began the collection of African
beadwork. The Gallery moved also, before 1990, to
collecting and displaying expressions of "Struggle
Art" as a form of commentary and support. (Chapter
7 takes up both kinds of move) .
• In a departure from the usual direction of gaze from
Europeans to Africans, Davison put together in 1988 a
collection of "African images of the exotic European".
These were "African carvings of Europeans, engra
vings of scenes on utensils, and paintings on walls".3
They are n o w listed as part of the South African
Museum' s ethnographic collection. Davison's collec
tion was based on the need to ask a neglected
question:
"Our knowledge of African culture has been based
largely on the observations of outsiders - firstly trav
ellers and colonisers, and later researchers. H o w were
these outsiders regarded by the indigenous people?"4
The collection was also prompted by Davison's concern
that:
"implicit in nineteenth century European perspec
tives of other cultures was the conceit that European
culture represented a peak of civilisation and achieve -
Cited in the 1996 White Paper on Arts, Culture and Heritage: All Our Legacies, Our Common
Future. Pretoria: D A C S T .
" This and other comments by Patricia Davison, unless otherwise noted, are from a 2001 inter
view with the author. Patricia Davison is an anthropologist with a history of work in several
museums in Cape T o w n . She was appointed to the position of Director of Social History
within the n e w Iziko structure for Cape Town's museums , with one particular task be
ing that of bringing together the South African M u s e u m and the more Afrikaner-oriented
Cultural History M u s e u m .
Davison, P. ( 1988 ) 'African Images of the Exotic European". Sagittarius, vol.3, p. 1. Available on
the website of IZIKO M u s e u m s : www.iziko.org.za/sam/resource/sagittar.htm.
"ibid.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 37
ment. A n uncritical transfer of the concepts of evolu
tion from natural history to cultural history relegated
the indigenous cultures of sub-Saharan Africa to
primitive tribalism".5
Reversing the object of the gaze was one way of under
mining that "conceit".
1994 - 2001: Further Forms of Challenge
and Change in South Africa
With 1994 came an even sharper personal recognition of
a need for a visible change. N o w there was among m a n y
m u s e u m staff the feeling expressed by Patricia Davison:
"What do w e do to signal that there has been a change?"
After 1994 came as well official calls for "transforma
tion". I shall order these by year:
1995: In this year, the Government issued the Pro
motion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act. A
commission was called for, with this seen as "a neces
sary exercise to enable South Africans to come to terms
with their past on a morally acceptable basis and to
advance the cause of reconciliation"6:
" W e can neither heal nor build, if such healing and
building are perceived as one-way processes, with
the victims of past injustices forgiving and the ben
eficiaries merely content in gratitude. Together w e . . .
must set out to correct the defects of the past".7
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was "set
up by the Government of National Unity to help deal
with what happened under apartheid. The conflict dur
ing this period resulted in violence and h u m a n rights
abuses from all sides. N o section of society escaped these
abuses".8
The Commission operated through three commit
tees, dealing with Amnesty, Reparation and Rehabilita
tion, and H u m a n Rights violations. A final report was
published in 2003, but the Truth and Reconciliation
Commission's ongoing hearings were widely covered in
the media. In effect, the details of abuses and the fact
that "no section of society escaped these abuses" was
very m u c h public knowledge.
D o such proceedings affect museums? At first sight,
they m a y not appear to do so. Hearings such as those
by the Commission, however, alter two aspects of any
museum's audience and functions. O n e of these is the
kind of knowledge that people bring to a m u s e u m .
Where this is low or out-of-date, museums m a y take
on the task of introducing people to n e w histories,
encouraging them to explore n e w areas or to revise ear
lier ideas. In South Africa, the widespread visibility of
the Commission's hearings left few people in ignorance
of past wrongs. The demand for that kind of m u s e u m
function accordingly was less than it might have been,
at least for one generation.
The other aspect influenced by events such as the
Truth and Reconciliation Commission's hearings is the
emotional readiness of people to tackle content of this
kind. In South Africa, the Commission's hearings seem
to have made even lower any readiness to present or to
encounter m u s e u m displays dealing with the occur
rence of injustices and the need to accept responsibility.
Instead, in Patricia Davison's view, what occurred was
a kind of 'malaise', a sense of 'enough' on this score,
and a need to move forward. H o w long does it take for a
drop in the 'malaise' and in the extent to which people
are already well-informed? H o w far do museums need
to plan ahead for such future shifts? These are questions
relevant in m a n y settings.
1995/96: The Government - more specifically, the
Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology
- issued a White Paper with the title Arts, Culture and
Heritage: All Our Legacies, Our Common Future. This
paper did not appear out of the blue. There had been
an earlier paper in 1994. Still earlier, the A N C in 1990
established "its o w n committee to look into a new
policy for museums" . This committee was then ready
to criticise and prompt the 1994 rejection of work by a
museums-policy committee that was established in 1992
by the previous government.9
The 1996 White Paper calls for some close attention.
O n e reason is that it provides a first look at the form
that a process labelled as consultation m a y take and at
the ways in which it is experienced by participants. The
other is the specific content of the paper. It spells out
the changes to be made by m u s e u m s : changes ranging
from what museums should display to shifts in admin
istrative structures and in funding. The latter changes
38 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "»• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
are perhaps those most likely to be recommended by
government departments. W h e n m u s e u m s have been
operating as separate and relatively autonomous admin
istrative structures, and have been relying on govern
ment funding, they are calls for change that cannot be
ignored.
The nature of consultation. 'Consultation' is one of
those large names for goals or practices that may, on the
ground, take m a n y forms. The consultation described
for the White Paper is a first example of h o w several
stakeholders contributed to and viewed the process.
In the White Paper's Foreword, the Minister for Arts,
Culture, Science and Technology (Dr. B .S . Ngubane)
described the paper as:
"distilled from numerous sources, voices and submis
sions. The most significant of these is the Arts and
Culture Task Group ( A C T A G ) report which repre
sents the views of a major part of the arts and culture
community, including practitioners, educators and
administers".10
In contrast, the convenor of the m u s e u m sub-com
mittee within the Heritage group of A C T A G (a group
combining museums with the National Monuments
Council and the National Archives) describes A C T A G as
not being given a strong voice:
"most of its recommendations were ignored within
the White Paper .... From the government's point of
view it seems that transformation of m u s e u m s was
mainly seen as a process of putting new structures
into place. A n e w structure does not necessarily m e a n
doing things differently. Doing things differently
means changing attitudes, minds and hearts".11
The Department in fact had a further set of advisors.
More fully, to draw again from Dr. Ngubane's Foreword:
"I would like to thank the White Paper writing team
and the core reference group for the White Paper for
their work, and especially to acknowledge the con
tributions of the international advisers, Dr. Michael
Volkerling of Victoria University, N e w Zealand, and
the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science of
The Netherlands . . . A C T A G represented the voice
of practitioners, expressing their views and con
cerns. The Ministry considered the A C T A G report
and subsequently conducted further investigations,
including activity-based costing, to determine the
viability of the various options it proposed. This
draft White Paper then, is a combination of A C T A G ' s
proposals, the Department's investigations, input
from the writers of this draft White Paper and its
Reference Group, and the Ministry's o w n views based
on its understanding of the workings, possibilities
and constraints facing the Government".12
The content of the Wliite Paper. Striking first of all is
the wide range of areas that the paper addresses. Arts
covered "all forms and traditions of dance, drama, music,
theatre, visual arts, crafts, design, written and oral lit
erature". Culture covered "the spiritual, material, intellec
tual and emotional features which characterise a society
or social group. It includes the arts and letters, but also
modes of life, the fundamental rights of the h u m a n being,
value systems, traditions, heritage and beliefs developed
over time and subject to change". Heritage "is the s u m
total of wildlife and scenic parks, sites of scientific and
historical importance, national monuments , historic
buildings, works of art, literature and music, oral tradi-
5 ibid.
The description of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission can be found at www.doi.gov.
za/trc/.
Part of Nelson Mandela's opening speech to Parliament, February 1996, cited m the White
Paper on Arts, Culture and Heritage, Op.cit., Chapter 2.
Truth and Reconciliation Commission web-site: www.doj.gov.za/trc/.
Kûsel, U . (2001) "Negotiating N e w Histories in a N e w South Africa". In Mclntyre, D . and
Wehner, K . (2001) National Museums: Negotiating Histories. Conference Proceedings. Can
berra: National Museum of Australia, p.30. Dr. Kusel was a director of the National Cultural
History Museum in Pretoria, established in 1964 in a fashion similar to the separation
noted earlier between the South African Museum and the South African Cultural History
Museum in Cape Town. In this case, the Departments of Cultural History, Archaeology and
Anthropology "were separated from natural history and became the National Cultural His
tory and Open-Air Museum" (Kusel, p.31 ). "When I took over as Museum director in 1985
.. . the museum had the stigma of being a conservative Afrikaans establishment, catering
largely for Afrikaners. It also was suffering severe financial problems" (p.311 and needed a
new building (p.32l: problems that the policies contained in the White Paper did not solve.
Ngubane, B.S. (1996) "Message from the Minister of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology".
In The White Paper on Arts, Culture and Heritage: All Our Legacies, Our Common Future.
Op.cit.
1 1 Kusel, U . (2001 ) Op.cit, p.31.
1 2 Ngubane, B.S. (1996) Op.cit.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 39
tions and m u s e u m collections".13
To break d o w n this content, I start with two propos
als that affect all three sectors (Art, Culture and Her
itage). The first proposes that what happens within all
three areas needs to he co-ordinated with overall economic
goals:
"The two discussion papers . . . published in 1995,
namely the Urban Development Strategy and the
Rural Development Strategy, provide the sociopolitical
context within which our policies will function".14
Important then are not only "principles of access, redress
and participation" but also economic costs (an issue
immediately raising questions of funding) and economic
benefits (an issue raising questions that range from the
generation of paid work to the promotion of exports).
The second proposal is for a change in orientation
toward other countries, but again with both national
identity and economic goals in mind:
"Against the background of a long history of cultural
isolation from the rest of the world, it is the goal
of the Ministry to facilitate international cultural
exchange".15
This facilitation, however, should not simply repeat "offi
cial cultural policy that previously favoured relations
with Europe and North America which resulted in a par
ticular bias .... W e are an African country".16
" W e are of Africa, yet have poorly developed cul
tural relations with our neighbours, as well as our
numerous partners in the South, especially Asia . . .
Particular attention will be given to .. . a regional
network of information on Indigenous African cus
toms and beliefs. The focus of this exchange will
be to forge closer ties between South Africa and
its neighbours ... and the need to create c o m m o n
markets and audiences for the arts, culture and herit
age industries of the region".17
That second proposal, as w e shall see in Chapter 7, pre
sented more problems for an art gallery that needed
to look to Europe for the loan of material (e.g. to the
French for an exhibition of African art) than it might
for a m u s e u m such as the South African M u s e u m where
the ethnographic material presented, however biased or
incomplete, was at least 'African'.
Those two proposals for change cut across the three
sectors: Arts, Culture, and Heritage. More specific
proposals emerge in the sections devoted to each sector.
O f the three, the two on Arts and Heritage include the
most comments on m u s e u m s and galleries. I start with
Heritage. The proposals for the 'Heritage Sector' are
actually the final set in the White Paper (Section 5). I
take this sector out of order, however, because of its ref
erences to " m u s e u m collections" and its call for sweep
ing administrative change:
"(T)he provision of m u s e u m services has lacked
co-ordination .... Planning has been fragmented,
m a n y communities do not have access to m u s e u m s ,
and cultural collections are often biased. Funds
are needed so that n e w m u s e u m s and m u s e u m s
outside the current national network can have access
to national funding. The Ministry's policy therefore
calls for transformation through a systematic process of
restructuring and rationalisation" .a
O n e of the first steps to be undertaken was then to be
a review determining which museums would be called
"national". The adjective "national", it was noted, had
been applied to institutions that were "budgeted for by
the Department because of ad hoc decisions in the past,
but they are not all of 'national' status in terms of their
collections or the services they provide".19
As w e shall see in Chapter 7 especially, decisions about
whether one's m u s e u m was to be declared "national"
and so eligible for national rather than more local
funding, took time and left m a n y directors uncertain
about their future.
A second step would be "a review of Declared Cul
tural Institutions".20 To be established immediately was
a new statutory body: a National Heritage Council that
"will seek to bring equity to heritage promotion and
conservation ... and will provide funding ... to institu
tions and projects under its remit":21
40 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
"The strategy will be to facilitate the development of a
structure and environment in which projects will be
initiated by the communities themselves".22
Exactly h o w those initiatives were to be developed or
encouraged, however, was left unspecified.
The other part of the White Paper warranting partic
ular attention to the content of proposals is the section
that focuses on the Arts (Section 2). It starts with some
general statements about the relevance of the arts to the
achievement of unity and diversity:
"Experiencing the creative expressions of different
communities .. . provides insights into the values and
aspirations of our nation. This experience develops
tolerance and provides a basis for national reconcilia
tion as well as building a pride in our diverse cultural
heritage".23
"The collision of cultures does not necessarily lead
to subjugation and hegemony. It m a y also lead to
subtle cross-pollination of ideas, words, customs, art
forms, culinary and religious practices".24
Such "dynamic interaction", however, cannot take place
w h e n some parts of the nation are subject to a "stifling of
expression, and indeed, to distortion". Fortunately, these
denied forms are "waiting in the wings to be reclaimed
and proclaimed as part of the heritage of us all".25
For those achievements to begin occurring, h o w
ever, shifts are seen as needed in function, education,
governance, and funding. The section on Performing
Arts Councils (Section 4) provides a particular example.
These Councils are noted in the White Paper as receiv
ing a large share of public funding, as urban-based, and
as focused on arts such as opera and ballet:
"The inescapable conclusion is that government is
subsidising expensive art forms and infrastructure
for a small audience at an unaffordable level . . . In
their present form, they" (the Councils) "will be
unable significantly to assist in realising the goals of
access and redress".
The first steps toward change then consist of "a shift in
funding (that) signals the transformation of the Perform
ing Art Councils from virtually free-standing production
houses to become infrastructure accessible to all". For
each of the next three years, the Performing Arts C o u n
cils would "receive declining subsidies .... At the end of
this period, government will subsidise the core infra
structure, core staff and essential activities .. . . This will
require them to diversify their funding base as well as to
restructure their ticketing policies".26
At the same time, as part of "reconstruction and
development, all forms of dance, music and theatre" were
to be "recognised as part of our cultural heritage'', with
funding for any such n e w programs apparently to c o m e
only by way of changes in "ticketing policies" or by way
of project by-project applications to the newly-estab
lished National Arts Council.
Access, redress, the recognition of diverse forms
of expression as valuable, and moves toward both
equitable public funding and self-funding: the same
themes emerge again in the section on "the visual arts":
"The Ministry will ensure that public institutions,
such as m u s e u m s , which have previously focused
attention on a narrow interpretation of the visual arts,
take cognisance of our craft and design heritage and
acknowledge this in their acquisition and education
policies. The Department will investigate the feasibil
ity of an Artbank or other mechanism to secure a self-
funding agency which provides opportunities for the
development and marketing of cultural industries".27
ibid., Chapter 1.
ibid., point 6, Chapter 2.
ibid., point 1, Chapter 7.
ibid., point 13, Chapter 7.
ibid., points 6 and 7, Chapter 7.
ibid., points 4, 9 and 10, Chapter 5. Emphasis added.
19
ibid., point 6, Chapter 5.
ibid., point 11, Chapter 5.
ibid., point 23, Chapter 5. Emphasis added.
ibid., point 29, Chapter 5.
ibid., point 34, Chapter 4.
ibid., Chapter 2. 25
ibid., points 1 and 2, Chapter 2.
ibid., point 21, Chapter 4. Emphasis added.
' ibid., point 29, Chapter 4.
Iziko brochure (2001) A New Vision For Our Museums: What's Your View? Cape Town: Iziko
Museums of Cape Town.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "v MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 41
1999: Did the White Paper's proposals have an impact?
Highly visible is certainly an impact on the adminis
trative structure of the country's museums. In Cape
Town , for example, 15 museums were merged into one
structure: a structure named Iziko Museums of Cape
T o w n - with Iziko meaning "hearth". Highly visible also
is the incorporation of the government's statements
of goals into the brochure currently given to visitors to
these museums. In the words of this brochure:
"In the White Paper on Arts, Culture and Heritage,
the Government sets out its vision for the promo
tion and the protection of our cultural heritage
and its commitment to nurturing creativity and
innovation".28
"Museums", the brochure continues, "contribute to four
main Government objectives:
• W e acknowledge diversity and promote unity by the
telling of stories that illustrate and illuminate the
great artistic, scientific and historic achievements of
South Africa.
• W e promote scholarship and education through
formal and informal learning programmes and
research.
• W e promote broad access by encouraging full part
icipation in m u s e u m activities and by reaching across
social and economic barriers.
• W e create opportunities for supporting economic
development by providing services to the tourism,
business and the scientific communities."
The Government's economic objectives appear also in a
comment on the new structure. The brochure describes
the Iziko structure as covering three sets of museums.
The first of these is "Natural History". This set includes
the South African M u s e u m - the m u s e u m selected for
specific attention in Chapter 3 - the Planetarium and the
West Coast Fossil Park. The second set is called "Social
History". This set of nine includes the Historic Houses
and Sites considered in Chapter 5. The third is "Art
Collections". This set of three includes the m u s e u m
considered in Chapter 7: the South African National
Gallery.29 The benefits noted are very m u c h in the White
Paper spirit:
" O n 1 April 1999 the national m u s e u m s in and around
Cape T o w n joined forces to become one of the larg
est m u s e u m services in the country. After decades of
separate and competitive existence, our complemen
tary roles and expertise are at last harnessed together
under a unified management and a single vision".30
Patricia Davison's narrative adds a further comment on
the restructuring:
"The White Paper . . . basically laid d o w n the frame
work for the museums , really transforming them
into institutions that reflected the demograph
ics of the country, and also that, over time, would
deal with the full history of South Africa .... Since
then there have been a number of key bits of legisla
tion and the formation of what were called the two
Flagships institutions.... There were about 17 national
museums at the time and some of them were cer
tainly not national, such as the Afrikaans Language
M u s e u m .... That ceased to be a national m u s e u m
quite soon. The outcome ... was that some of the
museums that had been considered as national were
(assigned) to the Provinces, and some of the museums
that definitely could be justified as being national
were grouped together. So you've got a clustering of
museums up in the North and you've got a cluster
ing of museums in the South, what were called the
Northern Flagship and the Southern Flagship. The
Southern Flagship became Iziko M u s e u m s of Cape
T o w n . There were five big institutions, but when you
unbundle them, it becomes about 15 different sites
that n o w constitute Iziko. It took a while to appoint
a C E O and lack (Lohman) came about one-and-a-
half years ago and his task is really to restructure the
organisation".31
2001: Did the changes recommended in the White Paper
work out to everyone's satisfaction? For the museums,
the time between 1996 and 1999 was clearly a time of
uncertainty with regard to status, direction, and fund
ing, with all museums facing the challenges of "working
42 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °*> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
together" and of finding ways to combine the represent
ation of diversity and the achievement of unity.
A n indicator of the Department's point of view
on impact is provided by the opening speech of the
then Acting Deputy Director General - M r . T h e m b a
Wakashe - at a conference called by the Department
of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology ( D A C S T ) to
review progress in the transformation of the "Heritage
Sector". The call for a conference reflected a concern at
D A C S T with the need for "an open dialogue between
and among ourselves" and a "re-dedication" to the
process of transformation. Toward that end, the thirty-
eight delegates to the conference were a mixture of
people from the Department and from institutions in the
heritage sector.
M r . Wakashe's opening address acknowledges con
cerns on both sides:
"As institutions you continue to face challenges relat
ing to a number of issues such as transformation and
restructuring, budgets that have remained static in
the face of a rising number of demands and expecta
tions. As a department w e have been lamenting the
slow pace of transformation and restructuring and
the difficult dialogue between ourselves and our
associated institutions .... The time has come for us
to sit together . . . sort out these difficulties, improve
our dialogue and pave the way for a vibrant sector".32
Acknowledged also is the presence of a number of spe
cific concerns on the part of the institutions involved:
"To some, this exercise (transformation) has been
viewed as one that has left the institutions feeling
besieged and powerless . . . as an exercise ... aimed at
getting rid of... expertise and experience".33
The aim, M r . Wakashe continues, is not to destroy but to
find ways in which "institutions ... are able to fulfil their
mandate". That mandate, however, has to be considered
with an eye to building the nation not only in terms of
identity but also economically:
" W e have identified sectors of our economy that
require special attention because of their potential
to contribute especially to the objectives of higher
growth rates and job creation. These include agri
culture, tourism, certain export sectors, cultural
industries, and the information and communication
sector".34
Clearly not all of D A C T S ' s goals had been achieved. H o w
people in m u s e u m s felt w e shall have more opportunity
to learn as w e take up in turn the three different kinds of
museums (Chapters 3,5 and 7).
Australia
I take as a dividing point the December 1993 launch of
a policy labelled Previous Possessions, New Obligations.
This call for change did not, as in South Africa, come
from the government itself, but from a m u s e u m group
(The Council of M u s e u m s Association - n o w M u s e u m s
Australia).
M u s e u m s Australia is a national association for
people w h o work in or are associated with m u s e u m s
and galleries in Australia, with funding support from
several government bodies and from membership fees.
It contains both a governing Council and, varying from
time to time, a number of Special Interest Groups. O n e
of these, after a period of "consultation with Indige
nous people working in m u s e u m s , government agencies
and community initiatives, with m u s e u m professionals
and staff and with governments",35 produced the 1993
paper laying out recommended policies for change in
m u s e u m s and galleries.
The title in itself conveys some of the paper's empha
sis. W h a t needed to change was the view taken of o w n -
Division as described in Iziko brochure (1991) Op.cit., p. 2.
3 0 Iziko brochure (2001) Op.cit., p. 3.
The present C E O is Prof. Jatti Bredekemp, appointed after Prof. Jack Lohman's appointment
in late 2002 to become C E O of the Museum of London.
Wakashe, T. (20011 "Opening Address". In Making Transformation Happen in the Heritage
Sector. Pretoria: DACST, p.3.
rbid, p.4.
President Thabo Mbeki in the State of the Nation Address to the National Assembly, Febru
ary 9, 2001. Quoted by Wakashe, T. ibid, pp.3-4. Emphasis added.
www.museumsuaustralia.org.au.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "•" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 43
ership and of what was due to Indigenous people. A
fuller description is offered in the website pages for
M u s e u m Australia and by Kelly, Gordon and Sullivan
in their 2001 evaluation of the extent to which the prin
ciples advocated by Previous Possessions, New Obliga
tions had become part of m u s e u m practice.
The overall aim was a set of general guidelines,
leaving individual m u s e u m s to find ways to implement
these:
"It was designed to establish a national policy frame
work which would provide consistency in guiding the
development of new partnerships between m u s e u m s
and Indigenous Australians, and to guide m u s e u m s
in framing their o w n procedures to support these
new partnerships .... The policy was built on 13
principles .... These . . . promote the primary rights
of Indigenous people in respect of cultural heritage
matters, and consultation with Indigenous peo
ple in the management of these collections ... The
principles emphasise that a comprehensive policy
for change should include strategies .. . emphasising
training opportunities leading to employment, sup
port for outreach activities, public programming and
interpretation, and governance".36
N e w partnerships, primary rights, consultation in the
management of collections, training for opportunities,
support for outreach activities: all of these were general
principles. They were also obligations that were not so
m u c h legally required as they were matters of moral and
professional standing, with the Association planning a
further evaluation of the extent to which policies had
become part of the practice of various m u s e u m s (this
evaluation became the basis for the 2001 paper by Kelly,
Gordon and Sullivan).37
W h a t had preceded the Association's paper? Behind
it w e m a y note some international changes in views
of m u s e u m s , and a series of political changes within
Australia.
Pre-1993: International Changes
Influencing Australian M u s e u m s
Preceding the 1993 paper were several international con
ferences addressing the issue of museums in relation to
Indigenous people and noted or attended by people in
Australian museums:
• U N E S C O Regional Seminar on Preserving Indigenous
Cultures: A N e w Role for M u s e u m s . This was held in
Adelaide, Australia (in 1978), and most Australian
museums were represented.38
• Meetings of the World Archaeological Congress (1989,
1990). These highlighted the obligations of m u s e u m s ,
with the obligation focusing - as one might expect
especially in archaeological meetings - on the return
of items in m u s e u m collections, with an emphasis on
secret/sacred objects and physical remains.
• The emergence of legislation in several countries to
protect Indigenous rights over their cultural property
and cultural heritage, and the development of n e w
phrasing. In a shift from "Preserving", for example,
a Canadian paper is titled Turning the Page: Forging
New Relationships Between Museums and Indigenous
People."
Pre-1993: A Changing Political Scene
Within Australia
Several events contributed to a focus more on achieving
"reconciliation" than on "nation-building" or "diversity
within unity". W h a t reconciliation might mean in prac
tice was not clear. The term, however, at least acknowl
edged that there was a divide, marked by a sense of
opposition and resentment on one or both sides.
As a start on seeing h o w events unfolded, it is helpful
to consider briefly some features of the Australian scene.
O n e of these is the division of responsibilities between
the States and the Commonweal th . The country started
as a collection of states, each with its o w n Parliament.
The move to federation came relatively late (early 1900's).
Most of the m u s e u m s had been established in the 1800's.
They were state-based and predominantly state-funded,
even though their names often implied a national
relevance (e.g., "The Australian M u s e u m " ) . The C o m -
44 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION n* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
monwealth's main m u s e u m responsibility is to m u s e u m s
in the capital city, Canberra: in particular, the National
Gallery of Australia and the National M u s e u m of
Australia (opened in 2001).
To simplify the political picture, there are often
negotiations and challenges between the C o m m o n
wealth and the States over areas of control and respon
sibilities for funding, often exacerbated by differences
in the dominant political party. In 2003, for example,
a Liberal/Country Party coalition had the majority
of seats in the lower house of the national Parliament.
(The position of Prime Minister goes to the leader of
the dominant party at this level). In contrast, the less
conservative Labor Party held the majority of seats in
all of the 7 State Parliaments. The Commonweal th ,
however, can often argue for a special involvement in
matters that cut across states. O n e of these, after 1969
(the year w h e n Aboriginals were granted citizenship
rights), was a responsibility for Aboriginal Affairs that
could over-ride the State regulations that had previously
been dominant.
A second special feature to the Australian scene
is the late rise in visibility for Indigenous people and
the extent of their dispossession and loss. In a partial
contrast to South Africa, the calls for change emerged
from a less sharp and obvious picture of physical seg
regation. In Australia, for example, there had not been
the same widespread and recent requirement of passes
required to live in, or be in, certain areas. Policies also
varied from state to state and from urban to rural areas.
There had been a pattern of Reserves, and a history of
forced dispossession from land that was deeply m e a n
ingful. (To this day, Aboriginal people often identify
themselves by reference to the place from which their
people came). The result was often the amalgama
tion into one place of groups with no clear associa
tions to each other, no shared language, and no sense of
belonging to the place they were moved to. Until 1969,
their movements from place to place were also often
restricted by State regulations, especially in states with
large and mostly rural groupings of Aboriginals.
By and large, however, the occurrence of physical
exclusion and restriction for Aboriginals before 1969 has
not been part of the awareness of most non-Indigenous
Australians. There is, for example, still little recognition
in history books that until 1969 the lives of Indigenous
Australians were often controlled by State Protection or
Welfare Boards. These boards could:
"decide where indigenous people could live, w h o m
they might marry or have relationships with, and
where and h o w their children could be raised. They
also . . . governed what property indigenous people
could o w n ... and also where people could travel,
w h o they could visit. Certain exceptions were m a d e
.... Aboriginal people referred to those exemption
certificates as 'dog tags' or 'dog licenses'."40
The position of Albert Namatjira provides a sharp example.
H e had become k n o w n nationally for his paintings
of Central Australia, in a style seen by most people as
essentially Western, to a point where he was awarded
the Queen's Coronation Medal in 1953 and 'honorary
citizenship' in 1957. A resident on the Papunya Reserve, he
nonetheless had to apply for permission to build his o w n
house (1951: denied), his children were regarded as wards
of the state, and in 1958 he was arrested and confined
to the Reserve for two months for the crime of sharing
alcohol with a relative w h o did not have 'honorary
citizenship' rights (rights to alcohol, in an odd juxtaposi
tion, came with citizenship).41
In a further contrast to South Africa, these events
emerged also from a demographic pattern of a minority
Indigenous population (the number of people self-iden-
Kelly, L , Gordon P., & Sullivan, T. (2000) Green Paper: An Evaluation of'Previous Possessions,
New Obligations': Museums Australia Policy for Museums in Australia and Aboriginal and
Torres Strait Islander Peoples. Canberra: Museums Australia, p.8.
ibid.
Griffin, D . (1998) "The Return of Indigenous Cultural Property". In Museum National, 7(1),
pp.7-9. The proceedings were published in 1980 - Edwards, R. and Stuart, J. (1980) Pre
serving Indigenous Cultures: A New Role for Museums. U N E S C O Regional Seminar, 1978.
Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service.
Referred to in Ames, M . (2000) "Are Changing Representations of First Peoples in Canadian
Museums and Galleries Changing the Cultural Prérogative?'1 In Kawasaki, A . (Ed. I The
Changing Presentation of the American Indian: Museums and Native Cultures. Washington
D . C : Smithsonian Institution
Australian Museum online: www.dreamtime.net.au/indigenous/social.cfm. By preference, I
cite here, and in some later paragraphs, material from the websites of the Australian M u
seum. They are designed for general and for schoolroom use and are in themselves one
indication of the intention of the Museum to provide a more inclusive picture of Austral
ian history and, in particular, to be in line with its mission, to move toward producing,
especially among non-Indigenous Australians, a fuller and more emphatic understanding
of Aboriginal history.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 45
tifying as Aboriginal is n o w reported as approximately
2 % of the total population of 20 million). For m u c h of
the non-Indigenous population, especially those living
in metropolitan areas, the Indigenous population could
be invisible. The issue was then never one of gaining the
balance of political power by election but of achieving
visibility, justice, and a change in perspective by other
means : by turning, for example, to the media for visi
bility and representation, to Australian or international
courts for justice, or to the general public, as well as
politicians, for a change of heart.
Pre-1993: The Rise of Local Challenges and
Changes
The 1960's saw the beginnings of challenge that was vis
ible to a larger section of the non-Indigenous popula
tion, and of change. I outline several of these events in
brief form, in part because they help describe the social
context for m u s e u m s and in part because they highlight
themes that m u s e u m s came to address within their col
lections and exhibitions:
1965: A group of Freedom Riders, borrowing strat
egies from the United States, challenged (by means
equivalent to 'sit-ins') the exclusion of Aboriginals from
s w i m m i n g pools and other settings (e.g. hotels, rest
aurants) in several Australian country towns. Media
coverage brought these exclusions to the surface and
into the awareness of city people w h o had not been
faced with the issue. Media coverage also highlighted
the mix of Aboriginals and non-Aboriginals within the
Freedom Rider groups: in itself a novel public combina
tion.
1967: A public referendum supported a legislative
change that gave Aboriginals the right to vote and to
be included in the census. The shift gave the C o m m o n
wealth government the power to legislate in ways that
could over-ride the regulations of various State govern
ments: governments that up to then had their o w n , and
variable, ways of regulating Aboriginal life. Over time,
C o m m o n w e a l t h m o n e y has become the major source
of legislative and financial support for bodies such as
A T S I C (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander C o m m i s
sion), or for any special provisions for education (e.g.
scholarships or housing loans, earmarked for Aborigi
nals or Torres Strait Islanders), making the position of
the C o m m o n w e a l t h government in these areas espe
cially critical.
1972/75: A Labor government came into power at the
Commonwea l th level. It was in power from December
1972 to November 1975. In 1975, it issued a Racial Dis
crimination Act. Exclusion from various places (hotels,
bars, restaurants) could n o w be legally and successfully
challenged, with the presence and outcome of the chal
lenge m a d e visible in media reports.
The Labor government also appointed arts advi
sors in remote Aboriginal communities. This led to
the escalation of art production as well as increased
distribution of remote artwork to both commercial and
private markets. Established as well, in 1975, was the
Australia Council for the Arts which, through its dedi
cated Aboriginal Arts Board, "encouraged n e w art
forms and ... put its support behind emerging artists in
urban and rural areas".42
1976: A Land Rights Act was issued. It created a route
by which specific claims could be m a d e for traditional
lands. It also altered the image of Australia as an empty
land (a Terra Nullius) settled by incoming people w h o
then had complete rights of possession, with no legiti
mate claim possible by the 'nomads' .
1985: In a fuller recognition of the significance of
land as a c o m m o n concern to both Indigenous and non-
Indigenous Australians, and of Aboriginal rights, the
C o m m o n w e a l t h government transferred, to its tradi
tional owners, ownership of part of a national park. This
is the park k n o w n as Uluru: a massive stone monolith
in Central Australia and both a major tourist attraction
and a central symbol for Aboriginals.
The agreement with the traditional owners of Uluru
was that the land would be leased back to the National
Parks and Wildlife Service, to be managed in conjunction
with the Uluru Kata Tjula Land Trust.43 Land and its
symbolic significance were, however, n o w publicly
underlined as a central topic to be worked through in
all moves toward inclusion, redress, or 'reconciliation',
both within and outside m u s e u m s . Land and its signifi
cance became, for example - as w e shall see in Chapter
4 - a theme picked up explicitly in the Australian M u s e
u m ' s presentation of Aboriginal Heritage.
1988: This was a year for official celebration of the
46 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
'First Settlement' in Australia (the arrival in Sydney of
the 'First Fleet' in 1788). In one recognition of different
perspectives, however, Aboriginal groups were able to
claim the date of White arrival as a Day of Mourning
and to erect 200 burial poles: one for each of the 200
years of 'settlement'. These tall, painted poles attracted
a great deal of media attention and public visibility.
Their juxtaposition with the official glory of the First
Fleet's arrival was a clear sign of there being more than
one version of history.
It was not as history, however, that the poles came to
appear, but as a form of art (an interesting commentary
on the routes by which change comes to be introduced).
The construction and display of the poles, from various
artists in A r n h e m Land (part of Australia's Northern
Territory) was a project initiated by Djon Mundine, an
Aboriginal Arts Adviser in Ramingining. The project
was offered to the National Gallery of Australia which
commissioned its translation into practice and display.
The set of poles was first shown at the Biennale of Syd
ney in 1988 and is n o w on permanent exhibition at the
Australian National Gallery, Canberra, with the title
"The Aboriginal Memorial".
1989: The Commonweal th government established
and funded ATSIC (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
Commission). The name reflects one recognition that
the Indigenous population contained diversity (Torres
Strait Islanders are marked by both similarities and
differences in beliefs and practices from Aboriginals).
For both, however, the structure of ATSIC was an indi
cation of some particular forms that 'shared power'
m a y take. ATSIC's Regional Councils and its Board of
Commissioners were to be Indigenous, and elected. The
staffing infrastructure was to be provided by C o m
monwealth public servants. The aim was to "ensure
m a x i m u m participation of Indigenous people in the
formation and implementation of government policies
that affect them", with ATSIC encouraged to "develop
policy proposals", to "make funding available for the
social, cultural, and economic advancement of Indig
enous people", and "to protect Indigenous sacred and
significant cultural material and information". All of
this, however, was to be within the general requirement
"to comply with overall directions of the Minister on
financial and other matters".44
1990: By unanimous vote (the members of all political
parties agreed), the Federal Government established the
Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation, to operate over
a 10-year period. This mixed group of Indigenous and
non-Indigenous Australians was charged with the task
of making recommendations to the government.
1990: A National Inquiry into Racist Violence took
the important step of asking Aboriginal people, and
people from other minority groups, what they saw as
the major issues in "the maintenance of racism and
misrepresentation".45 The main concerns expressed by
Aboriginals were with being portrayed negatively: "either
... as a threat to society or as victims". The main sources
of misrepresentation were seen as television and news
papers. The Commission, however, expressed its con
cern with misrepresentation in all media.
1991: This year saw a report based on an inquiry into
Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. The report documented
not only the disproportionate number of Aboriginals in
jails and detention centres (around 19% of this popu
lation compared with 1.6% of the general population)
but also the disproportionate number of deaths in cus
tody. The incidence of deaths, Justice Muirhead c o m
mented, called on "Australia . . . to examine a little of
our national character and the behaviour of people in
authority".46
1992: A speech by Paul Keating, the Prime Minister
in the next government (the Labor Party was in power
from 1991 to 1996) set the stage for particular kinds of
change within and outside museums . For that reason
(and because his position is not shared by the Liberal/
Country Party n o w in power), I cite this speech in some
detail.
In summary, it was an open acknowledgment
of responsibility ("the problem starts with us non-
Aboriginal Australians"). The primary appeal was to
1 2 Maloon, T. ( 1994) "The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Collection". In Neale, M . ( 1994)
Yiribana: An Introduction to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Collection. Sydney: The
Art Gallery of N e w South Wales.
www.dreamtime.net.au/indigenous/land.cfm.
www.atsic.gov.au/about_atsic/default.asp. The relevant minister is the Minister for Aborigi
nal Affairs, a m e m b e r of the prevailing Party and, given no Aboriginal Senator in either the
Labor or the Liberal Party, a non-Indigenous Australian). The one Aboriginal Senator is a
m e m b e r of the small Democratic Party.
www.dreamtime.net.au/indigenous/social.cfm.
www.dreamtime.net.au/indigenous/social.cfm.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 47
hearts and minds: to empathy ("imagine yourselves in
this position"), "a sense of justice", and a recogni
tion of Aboriginal contributions to Australian society
("they have shaped our identity"). The positive steps
to take then were for the non-Indigenous to become
better informed about "Aboriginal culture and achieve
ment" and to assist Aboriginal communities to take
more initiatives toward change. In a dual acknowl
edgment of international and local interest, Keating's
speech was given at the launch of the International Year
of the World's Indigenous People, and delivered in a
section of Sydney with an historically large Aboriginal
population (Redfern).
The speech begins with a recognition of where "the
problem" starts:
"(T)he starting point might be to recognise that the
problem starts with us non-Aboriginal Australians.
It begins, I think, with the act of recognition.
Recognition that it was w e w h o did the dispossess
ing. W e took the traditional lands and smashed the
traditional way of life. W e brought the disasters. The
alcohol. W e committed the murders. W e took the
children from their mothers. W e practised discrimi
nation and exclusion. It was our ignorance and our
prejudice. A n d our failure to imagine these things
being done to us. With some noble exceptions, w e
failed to make the most basic h u m a n response and
enter into their hearts and minds. W e failed to ask -
h o w would I feel if this were done to me?" 4 7
The advocated way forward then becomes one of:
• Recognising c o m m o n humanity: "(I)t might help us
if w e non-Aboriginal Australians imagined ourselves
dispossessed of land w e have lived on for 50 000 years
- and then imagined ourselves told that it had never
been ours. Imagine if ours was the oldest culture
in the world and w e were told that it was worthless.
Imagine if w e had resisted this settlement, suffered
and died in the defence of our land, and then were told
in history books that w e had given up without a fight.
Imagine if non-Aboriginal Australians had served
their country in peace and war and were then ignored
in history books.48 Imagine if our feats on sporting
fields had inspired admiration and patriotism and
yet did nothing to diminish prejudice. Imagine if our
spiritual life was denied and ridiculed. Imagine if w e
had suffered the injustice and then were blamed for
it. It seems to m e that if w e can imagine the injustice
then w e can imagine its opposite. A n d w e can have
justice".49
• Accepting but also moving beyond guilt: " D o w n the
years, there has been no shortage of guilt, but it has
not produced the responses w e need. Guilt is not a
very constructive emotion."
• Recognising past contributions as well as wrongs:
"Where Aboriginal Australians have been included
in the life of Australia they have made remarkable
contributions. Economic contributions, particularly
in the pastoral and agricultural industry. They are
there in the frontier and exploration history of
Australia . . . . In sport to an extraordinary degree. In
literature and art and music. In all these things they
have shaped our knowledge of this continent and of
ourselves. They have shaped our identity. They are
there in the Australian legend. W e should never forget
- they helped build this nation. A n d if w e have a sense
of justice, as well as c o m m o n sense, w e will forge a
n e w partnership."
• Assisting Indigenous communities to take "charge of
their o w n lives": " (A) ssistance with the problems which
chronically beset them is at last being made available
in ways developed by communities themselves."
• Assisting non-Indigenous Australians to be better-
informed: "If these things offer hope, so does the fact
that this generation of Australians is better informed
about Aboriginal culture and achievement, and about
the injustice that has been done, than any generation
before."
Here then are some reasons offered for change and some
proposed means by which goals such as "new partner
ships" or "new relationships" are seen as being achieved.
They will be by changing the perceptions and feelings of
the numerical majority through information, an appeal
to justice, "imagination and goodwill", with an added
appeal for the encouragement of Indigenous initiatives.
N o w w e need to see h o w that kind of vision turned out
in practice.
48 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ' ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
After 1993 : Forms of Challenge and Change
By 1993, the stage was set for m u s e u m changes in the
direction of 'partnerships', 'consultation', 'reconciliation',
the recognition of injustice, and a change in the knowl
edge, understanding, and feelings of those with the larger
share of power: the non-Indigenous.
This was the general backdrop for the 1993 M u s e u m s
Association paper with its title, Previous Possessions,
New Obligations. The events described so far, however,
do not indicate what particular moves m u s e u m s might
m a k e in the direction of 'new partnerships'. S o m e
further events influenced both those moves and the
kinds of background information and attitudes that
non-Indigenous audiences might bring to a m u s e u m .
1995: A n inquiry was established on what has come
to be k n o w n as "The Stolen Generation" (the report,
tabled in M a y 1997, carries the title - Bringing Them
Home). This brought a recognition of loss, not by dying-
out from neglect or massacre, but from the planned
break-up of families and the 'whitening' of the A b o
riginal population. Continuing until the late 1960's in
several places, children w h o were less than 'full-blood'
were removed from their families, placed for adoption
or fostering by white families or - more often - placed
in mission homes or orphanages, where they were
trained to be domestic servants or stockmen (never
assigned back to the areas where their families were)
and encouraged, or required, to marry other than full-
blood. The main boys' h o m e (Kinchela) and girls' h o m e
(Cootamundra) were not closed until 1969.50
The events brought out by this Commission were not
as savage as m a n y brought out by South Africa's Truth
and Reconciliation Commission. The descriptions of
removal, however, were a heart-rending eye-opener for
most non-Aboriginal Australians, especially since the
evidence often came from people currently living, n o w
being re-united, or n o w commenting on never seeing
their children or their parents again. This was hardly
a distant past and gave rise to what became k n o w n as
a National Sorry Day, with people, rather than govern
ments, signing expressions of regret and apology. The
battle was clearly seen as one for 'hearts and minds' as
well as for legislative changes.
1997: Aboriginals m a k e explicit their wish also for
'reconciliation', with due recognition of past injustice
and loss. In the words of Mick Dodson in 1997 (he was
at that time Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social
Justice Commissioner):
" W e have extended our hand to other Australians.
Those Australians w h o take our hand are those
w h o dare to dream of an Australia that could be. In
true reconciliation, through the remembering, the
grieving and the healing, w e become as one in the
dreaming of this land. This is about us and our coun
try, not about the petty deliberations of politics. W e
must join hands and forge our future. Will you take
our hand? Will you dare to share our dream?"51
2000: The Reconciliation Council's recommenda
tion for a formal apology with regard to the "Stolen
Generation" by the Commonweal th Government
was not accepted. Formal apologies had been m a d e
by most State governments and by several Church
bodies. The Conservative Party n o w in power at the
Commonweal th level, however (the Prime Minister
especially) took the view that a formal apology implied
guilt on the part of contemporary Australians, might
have legal consequences in the form of claims for c o m
pensation, was based on a "black armband" view of Aus
tralian history, and detracted from the task of "practi
cal reconciliation", especially in the direction of health
and education. The title "Aboriginal Reconciliation"
was n o w changed to "Reconciliation Australia", appar
ently signalling that the task of reconciliation was still
incomplete. Public opinion was divided with regard to
the Prime Minister's position. The issue, however, was
highly public. N o museum-visiting group (at least none
w h o were 'local' rather than 'international') would have
been unaware of the issue, and no museum's account of
Aboriginal or Australian history could ignore it.
www.apology.west.net/redfern.
Aboriginals had enlisted in both World Wars I and II, even though they were not regarded
as citizens, could not vote, and were not given after these wars the rewards or privileges
offered to other veterans.
www.apology.west.net/redfern. The speech is also reproduced in M . Gratten (Ed.) (2000)
Essays on Australian Reconciliation. Melbourne: Black Inc.
The full report can be found at http://www.austlii.edu.au.
dreamtime.net.au/indigenous/social.cfm.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 49
200i: The 1993 paper left a great deal to be imple
mented separately by particular m u s e u m s . M a n y of
the changes after 1993 are then better picked up within
the chapters that deal with specific m u s e u m s . In 2001,
however, a report was issued that covered the results
of a cross-museum review instigated by the M u s e u m s
Association. The aim was to ask h o w far Australian
m u s e u m s had moved toward implementing the prin
ciples continued in the 1993 paper. In all, 33 m u s e u m s
responded to the request for comments. From the
results put together by Kelly, Gordon and Sullivan52, I
single out the following:
• Most m u s e u m s saw the general principles as already
well accepted. N o re-statement was seen as needed.
• Several areas of difficulty remained. A m o n g these
were:
- Prior consultation with Indigenous communities
(prior in the sense of before exhibitions were
planned or assembled rather than asking for
review after these stages had been completed).
- Tapping into central resources to support regional
initiatives. Resources often came from or were
distributed by the museums in large cities. W h e n
resources became scarce or w h e n special funding
dried up, regional centres or regional initiatives
tended to lose out.
- Changes in staffing, directed toward the increased
representation of Aboriginals. As w e shall see
in later chapters, representation had increased
considerably from the previously very low levels.
Aboriginals had, for example, moved into several
curatorial positions. Difficulties were nonetheless
experienced in obtaining funds for the training
needed to strengthen representation still further,
both in the major cities and in the regional
centres.
2001/2003: A n e w m u s e u m was opened in the Federal
capital, Canberra, in 2001. This was the National M u s e u m
of Australia ( N M A ) with D a w n Casey (an Aboriginal) as
its Director. Canberra was already the site for a National
Art Gallery (a gallery with an increasing coverage of
Aboriginal art) and a National Library with a great deal
50 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION t»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N
of archival material. The charter for the N M A was to
address the nation's history: to collect historical materi
als and to curate exhibitions. The charter was established
by the Labor Government in the 1980's. The next govern
ment - headed by the Liberal Party - provided in 1996
land for the site and funding for the building.
The N M A opened to general acclaim for the m o d
ern-style building and its site, but with signs already of
challenge to what was seen as a biased view of history.
O n e political critic, for example, objected to "the indig
enous exhibits as a victim episode" and to the inclusion
of figures such as "the anti-nuclear protester Benny
Zable" rather than figures such as "mining boss H u g h
Morgan".53 Another critic - the historian Keith W i n d -
schuttle - saw the m u s e u m as "a repository of nothing
more than the intellectual poverty of the tertiary-edu
cated middle class of the post-Vietnam era".54 W i n d -
schuttle is the author of a controversial publication: The
Fabrication of Australian History.55
The N M A and its exhibitions came again under
review (called for in January 2003). Funding and
encouragement for the review came from the Depart
ment of Communication, Information Technology and
the Arts. The review group was appointed by the m u s
eum's governing body, its Council. The review was to
"look at the museum's performance, including its con
tent, exhibitions and public programs, against its act
and charter".56 The plan for a review, and the c o m p o
sition of the review group, generated mixed responses.
The tone of these is indicated by two newspaper articles.
O n e of these saw the review in positive terms, as a
timely occasion for "settling the central question that
has hovered over the m u s e u m since its opening two
years ago: D o the exhibits overall present a view of Aus
tralian history that implicitly assumes the deliberate
destruction of the Aboriginal race, at the expense of cel
ebrating white achievements in the time since European
settlement? "57
The other was far less positive. It saw the N M A
review as a conservative backlash, as a "politically-
driven attempt to rein in the museum's portrayal of
history and open a n e w front in the Howard Govern
ment's ideological culture wars. A battle-royal between
the black-armband view of Australian history, so disap
proved of by the Prime Minister - w h o sees it as a belief
that most Australian history since 1788 has been little
more than a disgraceful story of imperialism, exploita
tion, racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination
- and the celebratory three cheers view".58
In part as a result of this review and the surround
ing debates, D a w n Casey's position as Director of the
M u s e u m was not renewed and she left the m u s e u m in
2003 to the dismay of m a n y m u s e u m practitioners.
I shall come back to the review in Chapter 9, in the
course of proposing that a useful way to choose further
museums - museums that will add to our understand
ing of particular forms of challenge and change - is to
look at those that are poised at particular moments of
challenge. The establishment of a review so soon after
the establishment of the N M A , however, is already an
indication of a quality to be kept in mind in relation to
any change. This has to do not only with h o w a change
comes about but also the extent to which it stays in
place, withers for lack of support, or is actively undone.
Moving To Specific Museums
The chapters that follow take up specific museums, with
the pairs of chapters divided by the type of m u s e u m cho
sen. Natural History museums that contain also a cul
tural or ethnological section form the first pair (Chapters
3 and 4). Historic Sites form the next (Chapters 5 and 6).
Art Galleries round out the set (Chapters 7 and 8).
The aim throughout is twofold. O n e is to learn more
about the forms that challenge and change take and
the circumstances that shape them. The other is more
at the level of practice. Turning to specific m u s e u m s
should bring out in concrete fashion forms of challenge
that other museums might anticipate and, in both a
concrete and positive fashion, forms of change that they
might borrow, adapt, or actively avoid.
Guiding the move are the questions: W h a t have w e
learned so far? W h a t n o w needs to be added and is likely
to be added by turning to specific museums? S o m e first
answers to those questions can be seen by consider
ing four issues: two related to links between museums
and social changes, and two related to the sources and
content of calls for change.
The relevance of museums to political and social
changes. Early in Chapter 1, I asked if museums might
not be seen as irrelevant to 'real events'. The events
described so far make it clear that this is not the case.
M u s e u m s are often seen as worthwhile targets for
change, as arenas where issues of presence, respect,
ownership and identity are made concrete and m a y
be worked out. W e still need to know, however, what
makes some museums particularly attractive as targets
for change. It is unlikely, for example, that they are
all regarded as equally relevant or, even if relevant, as
equally worthy of efforts to bring about change. W h a t
makes some seem more important or more feasible
targets for change than others? W h a t makes some
attract particular calls for change?
The relevance of political and social events to museum
functions and practices. The events described so far
make it clear that museums do not exist in isolation
from the rest of the society to which they belong. They
do not stand in any solitary splendour, separated from
the wash of events around them. The task n o w is to pin
d o w n h o w those events exert an influence. W e have
seen so far, for example, influences occurring by way
of changes in administrative structure, in funding, and
in the background information and attitudes of visi
tors. There are undoubtedly other routes, and w e need
to identify these.
In addition, influences are seldom one-sided. W e
have seen little so far, however, of the means and
the resources that museums can draw on to resist or
modify particular calls for change. Take, for example,
an impact by way of the demand or the need to attract
new sources of funding or new audiences. Some m u s
eums will be more able than others to meet these partic
ular calls for change. S o m e can, for example, start charg
ing for admission or find new sponsors more readily
than others. Some museums are also more willing than
. Kelly, L., Gordon P., & Sullivan, T. (2000) Op.cit.
David Barnett is the authorised biographer of the conservative Prime Minister John Howard.
Cited in The Sydney Morning Herald, Jan.4-5, 2003, News Review, p. 13.
Keith Windschuttle quoted in The Sydney Morning Herald, ibid.
Windschuttle, K (2002). "The Fabrication of Australian History".
New Criterion, vol. 20, No . 1
The Sydney Morning Herald,]an.4-5, 2003, News Review, p. 13.
5 7 Glenn Milne in The Australian, Dec.30, 2002, p.2.
Joyce Morgan, The Sydney Morning Herald, Jan.4-5, 2003, News Review, p. 13.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 51
others to make particular changes. A m u s e u m that in
the past has served a primarily scientific function and
has seen research as its core function, for example, is
likely to respond with least enthusiasm when asked to
accommodate what it sees as 'hordes of schoolchildren'
or as having to become a source of 'entertainment',
putting on 'blockbuster' shows to earn its bread and
butter. These aspects of change come to the surface only
when w e turn to specific museums .
The varying sources of calls for change. W e have seen
that calls for change m a y come from more than one
source and that these sources m a y differ in what they
see as especially needed. T w o major stakeholders have
emerged: representatives of government and of m u s e u m
staff or m u s e u m associations. Emerging also are indi
cations of the kinds of calls for change that m a y come
from each. Changes in administrative structure are
prominent on the government list, possibly displacing
m u s e u m staff from positions of control or expertise.
Changes in 'consultation' and 'obligations' come more
from m u s e u m associations, probably leaving control
over decision-making mostly in the hands of m u s e u m
staff.
N o w w e need to begin identifying other stakehold
ers and the kinds of calls for change they are likely to
make . These other stakeholders m a y be of m a n y kinds,
ranging from a museum's Boards or Trusts to its visi
tors, its supporting 'Friends' or donors, to members
of the communities represented. Each is likely to seek
particular kinds of change or to offer particular kinds of
objections to what m u s e u m s display or h o w they m a k e
decisions. M u c h has been said, for example, about the
significance of Indigenous communities. Not yet clear,
however, are the specific calls for change that they are
especially likely to make . Changes in the general direc
tions of 'increased access', 'increased representation', or
'a more balanced history' seem likely to be on the list.
These are, however, too broadly stated to make clear
additions to our understanding or to allow borrowing
as a means of improving m u s e u m practice.
W e also need to begin identifying more closely w h y
various stakeholders matter. They matter, it seems so
far, because they hold resources that can facilitate or
constrain what m u s e u m s do. That line of impact is
especially clear for m u s e u m s that rely almost totally
on government funding. Even when government
funding is not a prime source, however, government
bodies have regulatory powers. They can, for example,
deny a m u s e u m the right to display particular kinds of
material or, at worst, deny it the right to operate at all.
H o w other stakeholders exert an effect, and h o w they
compete with each other for influence, are aspects of
calls for change that w e have seen only in passing. Only
specific museums can bring out those aspects.
Advocated directions and means for change. W e have
seen so far the emergence of some large directions - new
obligations, national unity, reconciliation - and some
general means (the 'big stick' of government fiat, the
arguments for persuasion directed toward a change in
'hearts and minds'). Only by looking at specific m u s
eums are w e likely to come close to h o w those direc
tions and means are translated into practice. To take
one example, 'consultation' is often proposed as the
way forward: consultation between museums and gov
ernment departments, or between m u s e u m staff and
representatives of Indigenous communities.
W e k n o w little so far, however, about h o w 'consulta
tion' actually proceeds. There are indications already
that difficulties can revolve around different percep
tions of when advice should be asked for (e.g., consult
before an exhibition is planned or at a point of near-
final review?) and of whose advice or expertise should
be the more respected. I may, for example, ask and
listen but then decide that m y judgment and m y exper
tise should prevail. To what extent is that perceived by
both parties as 'consultation'? H o w can w e learn more
about the ways in which consultation - or negotiation -
actually proceed or are expected to proceed?
For those several gaps and questions, the best way
forward lies in turning to particular museums : places
where w e can see in more detail and more concretely
h o w events unfold. The next chapter - Chapter 3 -
begins the taking of that step.
52 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION >*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
CHAPTER 3
Ethnographic Collections In
Natural History Museums:
The South African Museum
CH A P T E R S 3 A N D 4 offer the first analyses of
specific museums. The two chosen are the South
African M u s e u m in Cape T o w n (Chapter 3)1 and the
Australian M u s e u m in Sydney (Chapter 4). Both are
museums with a mix in what is displayed. S o m e of the
material is usually described as covering 'natural history'
(fossils, rocks, plants and animals from past and current
times). S o m e - in a first example of divisions that create
difficulties - is often labelled as 'cultural' or, to use the
name given in the South African M u s e u m , as 'ethno
graphic'. It usually covers exhibitions describing 'ancient
cultures' and 'early m a n ' or, more specific to a particular
country, the 'first peoples' of a region, noting their 'mate
rial culture' (pots, weapons, art forms, clothing) and their
ways of life. In both of the museums w e shall consider,
the sections on 'natural history' occupy the larger space.
W h y turn to specific museums? To repeat an argu
ment offered at the end of Chapter 2, specific m u s e u m s
pin d o w n the forms that challenge and change m a y
take and the ways in which general aims and means for
change (from 'new partnerships' to 'nation-building'
or 'consultation') are translated into practice. Without
those steps, challenge and change are left in limited or
abstract shape. Without them also, w e lack concrete
examples of what other m u s e u m s might anticipate,
borrow, or avoid.
That general argument, however, does not cover
what this particular pair of m u s e u m s offer specifically.
Briefly, m u s e u m s of this type bring out some particular
hazards, inviting some particular calls for change and
some particular difficulties to overcome. M u s e u m s of
this type introduce importantly a further set of stake
holders. These are the 'first peoples' often represented
in historically-oriented m u s e u m s . The representations
of these 'first people' offer concrete examples of'nation-
building' and 'national identity'. They embody m u c h of
the conflict between 'first people' and later colonisers.
The hazards and difficulties that appear especially
in Chapter 3, for example, start with the very juxtapo
sition of natural and ethnographic collections. People
m a y then seem to be "treated in m u c h the same way
as butterflies and birds .. . presented as if they were . . .
specimens"2, with some evolutionary line applied to
both. The emphasis on the past makes it easy to regard
people from 'old' groups as irrelevant to the present
or - if 'old' is equated with 'primitive' - as people with
no complexity to their narratives, art forms, beliefs, or
ways of thinking. They m a y also be seen as a people
w h o needed to give way to 'progress', whose history and
achievements will be of less interest and importance
than those of the people w h o came later and m a d e the
country a modern state. If an 'old' and colonised group
can also be presented as essentially 'nomadic' or 'hunter-
gatherer' in life-style, then their land can easily be cast
as 'empty', 'not really being used', and 'open for set
tlement' without the kind of dispossession that might
move the colonisers to feel some degree of sympathy or
some twinges of conscience.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "•» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 53
The stakeholders to emerge with their o w n calls for
change are n o w members of the 'first peoples' groups.
They add considerably to the cast of characters that
stood out in Chapter 2: representatives of government
and of m u s e u m staff or m u s e u m associations. W e m a y
n o w expect to see some particular calls for change to
appear or to be emphasised. Given the implications that
can be read so easily into past practices in historically-
oriented m u s e u m s , for example, it is not surprising to
find - in both Chapters 3 and 4 - objections to being pre
sented as irrelevant, disappearing, primitive, or without
rights when it comes to decisions about methods of col
lection or display. The moves toward change (advocated
or begun) m a y then be toward undoing the implica
tions of disappearance, irrelevance, or simple states of
mind and action. The moves toward that undoing m a y
be directed toward what is displayed or the nature of a
display. They m a y also be toward altering the process
of decision-making, adding some forms of consultation
or - more strongly - acknowledging the rights of owner
ship, the powers of veto, and the validity of claims for
the return of collected material.
W e shall see a variety of hazards, difficulties, and
moves toward change in the course of the chapter,
together with several additions to the cast of stake
holders. In terms of structure, the chapter follows the
plan outlined in Chapter 1, reflecting various ways of
studying m u s e u m s . Offered first is a brief visitor's eye
view, providing a sense of the physical layout and the
exhibits. This is followed by a description of the growth
of the m u s e u m , from its establishment in 1825 until the
political watershed events of 1990 - 1994. That descrip
tion helps account for h o w ethnographic material
came to be part of a m u s e u m intended from the start
to emphasise natural history, and came to cover some
particular representations of people.
The third section deals with events within the
m u s e u m and within broader cultural policy after 1994.
Particular attention is given to a first delineation of
calls for change from Indigenous groups and of the
ways in which the South African M u s e u m has met these
or is considering meeting them. The set generated is not
unique to the S A M (to use the abbreviation often used
in the museum's self-descriptions). The aim, in fact, is to
work toward a set that will be relevant to other m u s e m s .
The final section looks at an iconic case of challenge
and change. This is the display k n o w n as the Bushman
diorama (referred to as the Karoo diorama on the Iziko
website). The diorama presents a group of Khoi-San
people in a hunter-gatherer setting. It is a long-standing
feature of the S A M . The mannequins were made in
1906, the diorama in 1959/60. The diorama, however,
was withdrawn from display in 2001 and in 2005 its
future is still under debate. The withdrawal presents
not only a specific occasion of challenge and change. It
also provides a first occasion for considering an issue
that will re-appear in later chapters and that surfaces in
m a n y m u s e u m s . This is the portrayal of black African
people. The diorama also relates to a further issue that
arises later in this chapter and others - the significance
of h o w bodies or body parts are treated, and the need
to ask: W h a t is found objectionable or reasonable with
regard to bodies? W h a t gives them - or some of them
- particular meanings?
The chapter draws on several sources: printed mate
rial, web-sites, time at the m u s e u m , and - a source
especially acknowledged - interview time with Patricia
Davison. Her long and continuing involvement in
several Cape T o w n m u s e u m s provides a particular
opportunity to go beyond print, to begin to see h o w
events are experienced, and to learn about changes
being considered or planned as well as those already in
place.
A. A Visitor's Eye View
To repeat a point made in Chapter 1, one way to study
museums is to look at their physical qualities: at the sites
they occupy, the nature of buildings, the layout of spaces,
the extent to which they 'invite people in' or the extent to
which they seem designed to encourage activity, thought,
a sense of ownership, or silent awe.3
The visitor facing the S A M sees a white four-storey
building in a neo-classical style, set in a central part of
the city and placed in gardens that were once the Dutch
East India C o m p a n y Gardens. The surrounding neigh
bourhood is n o w a mixture of gentrified and commer
cial inner-city. Relatively close by is an area k n o w n as
District Six. Before the 1960's and 70's demolition, this
54 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
area was h o m e to a relatively broad section of soci
ety though predominantly coloured. It was officially
declared in 1966 to be a "White Group area". Because
of its position, however, the m u s e u m was accessible to a
broad group of people in its early years.
Entering the building, the visitor finds on the ground
floor a set of three rooms housing the archaeological
and ethnographic collections. The first room includes
rock art, including the famous Linton stone, together
with a description of the work of a particular researcher,
Prof. D . Lewis-Williams, whose decoding of the slab
has brought out its significance for religious ritual and
beliefs about the nature of the spirit world. The focus is
on the researcher but the implicit message is also one of
the designs having religious meaning rather than being
simple or 'mindless' decoration.
The second room previously housed the B u s h m a n
diorama: a diorama displaying figures of Khoi-San peo
ple as hunters and gatherers around a camp-site in the
Karoo area. This is the diorama described in the S A M
website as currently "archived" while opinions about
what should be done with it are sought.
The third room contains a further selection of plas
ter-cast figures representing several tribes in a variety
of activity scenes (e.g. as herders or pastoralists). The
emphasis is on the rural past, with little late or urban
coverage. The visitor w h o has read the website descrip
tion ("physical and technological development of peo
ple in Southern Africa during the past two million
years")4 might find surprising the lack of material on
present and urban African culture. The visitor expect
ing 'the past' would find the displays more in keeping
with expectations.
The display in fact suggests no marked break between
past and present, leaving the impression that the people
represented still are in rural areas and engaged only in
rural subsistence tasks. Only the small and unlit pho
tographs taped to the glass show 'modern' members
of these groups. These photographs, however, are eas
ily overlooked and might be read as representing a split
between rural and urban members of the group. The
room includes a disclaimer, again poorly lit, stating that
the curators are aware that the impression m a y be that
the people shown have been 'frozen in time', and that
the exhibition will eventually be updated.
O n the ground floor also are natural history remind
ers of what is 'old'. Here are animal and plant fossils
from 300 million years ago, fossil m a m m a l s of the Cape
4 million years ago, and dioramas of ancient Karoo
reptiles. The rest of the ground floor is taken up mainly
by nature exhibits - the World of Water, the Southern
Oceans, and the "Whale Well" which can be seen from
all floors and includes skeletal remains of large South
ern Ocean whales. The remaining space includes a café
and the M u s e u m shop. This shop sells objects that are
m u c h the same across the several m u s e u m s in the Iziko
group: mostly traditional African crafts with, at the
S A M , the addition of literature on African flora and
fauna.
The floors above the ground floor are given over to
a variety of animal and mineral exhibitions emphasis
ing the role of the m u s e u m as 'natural history', which
sets the ethnographic material in particularly difficult
light. The only two emphasising h u m a n activity are the
"printing gallery" - a "collection of historical printing
machines and exhibits on typesetting and papermak-
ing", and a "special exhibition" on "the history and
growth of the South African M u s e u m " . 5
B. The Growth Of Collections:
From Establishment To 1994
This section reflects a second way of studying museums:
looking back to their history and the way this has shaped
both past and current practices. The section begins with
a description of the early collections and then selects
some major events. Included, for example, are the rise of
As in Chapter 2,1 a m particularly indebted to Dr. Patricia Davison for a narrative account of
events and for comments on the ways in which these were experienced. Note that through
out this text we use the preferred form Khoi-San but have not changed quotes which often
feature the form Khoisan.
" The comment comes from Kenneth Hudson, in an early criticism of the South African Mus
eum reported in interview by Patricia Davison. It could apply, however, to all museums that
mix natural and ethnographic material.
The last visit to the museum was in November 2001. At this time Patricia Davison had recently
been appointed to the position of Curator for Social History in the new grouping of 15
Cape Town museums into the structure named IZIKO, with one of these being the South
African Museum. Jatti Bredekamp's epilogue to this book, however, provides a description
of the changes made since 2001/2002. 4
www.museums.org.za/sam.
www.museums.org.za/sam/exh/experm.htm.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 55
concerns with recording a 'disappearing' people (disap
pearing both in physical type and in their crafts) and, in
1964, the physical division (separate buildings) between
"natural history" and some parts of "cultural history"
together with the placement of the latter under a depart
ment responsible for "White O w n Affairs". Noted also
is the position of the S A M as protests began to develop
against the orientations and the displays of Cape Town's
museums .
Why bother with such history? A major reason is that
history gives us one indication of practices and ways
of thinking that m a y need to be overcome in order to
introduce change. It also helps separate those that are
recent from those that have been present from the start,
and asks whether these vary in the resistance they offer
to change or in their value as markers of change.
Starting early in the S A M , for instance, were separ
ations between colonisers and colonised not only by
physical space but also by casting the 'first people' in a
remote, rural, and self-contained past with little or no
indication of h o w the colonisers and colonised were
linked to one another. Early separations emerged also
along disciplinary lines, with some disciplines clearly
holding privileged status from the start while others
struggled for a recognised place.
Starting early also was an emphasis on differences
a m o n g people, physical differences especially: an
emphasis contributed to by an orientation toward phys
ical anthropology rather than an anthropology empha
sising the social organisation or the beliefs of various
groups. Starting early as well was a sense of unease as
to where the local ethnographic material should be
placed, especially when a m u s e u m is seen as celebrating
the achievements and the history of a dominant group.
W e shall see some of these early background practices
appear also in other m u s e u m s (e.g. in the Australian
M u s e u m described in Chapter 4). South Africa's history,
however, gives them some particular shapes, inviting
particular forms of contest and calls for change.
First Collections:
A n Emphasis on Natural History
The South African M u s e u m was established in 1825 by
the Governor of the Cape of G o o d Hope , Lord Charles
Somerset. It was first housed within the Public Library
(the building n o w renamed the Slave Lodge). In 1855, the
S A M was reconstituted under a Board of Trustees and, in
i860, was moved with the Library to n e w quarters. Plans
for a building of its o w n were made by the mid-1880's,
and in 1897 the S A M moved into its present building at
the top of the C o m p a n y Gardens. With these moves the
divisions between "natural history" and "white cultural
history" began to be separated.
Patricia Davison's review of the annual reports issued
after 1855 prompts a comment on the early emphasis on
natural history rather than cultural material:
"You can see the emphasis right from the early days. It
was seen to be a place where research would be con
ducted, sort of like those old omnibus m u s e u m s ... it
was going to collect representative specimens of the
natural history of South Africa, and it was going to
invite donations around the areas of zoology ... and
botany in those days ... all the natural history disci
plines, and then archaeology.
Archaeology only became archaeology in around
the 1920's. The disciplines hadn't quite emerged yet,
so there was a section of the collections which was
called 'miscellaneous'. There were antiquities and
there were books and coins and things that didn't
quite fit into any of the natural history things".6
The rollcall of Directors is a further indication of the
early orientation toward natural history, with cultural
material as a sideline. The first was Dr. Andrew Smith, an
Edinburgh trained army surgeon, with a major interest in
natural history and some interest in anthropology. After
Dr. Smith returned to Britain in 1837, the Directors were,
variously, entomologists, taxidermists, zoologists, orni
thologists or ichthyologists. In 1906, however, a Director
was appointed w h o also had an interest in archaeology.
H e was Director until 1924 and his interests had a lasting
effect on the S A M .
Patricia Davison comments:
"Most m u s e u m s have key personalities in the growth
of the institution, and there was such a person here
called Louis Peringuey. H e came from the Basque
country between France and Spain ... he came ... to
56 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
study vines, viticulture, and the insects that affect
vineyards. H e started working at the m u s e u m when
it was still a young institution. I think .. . he'd been
working at the m u s e u m from the 1890's as an ento
mologist.
W h e n Louis Peringuey was doing his work on
whatever beetle causes phylloxera he started finding
hand axes at Stellenbosch in the vineyards .... he rec
ognised that he was dealing with a h u m a n artefact
here and he wrote a book called The Stone Ages of
Southern Africa. H e is considered the father of archae
ology in South Africa.
Peringuey was also responsible for the rock-art . . .
being saved, as it were ... there was land surveying
going on and roads were being built and shelters were
being damaged. H e heard from one particular land
surveyor that this magnificent shelter on the farm
called Linton was possibly going to be destroyed and
at great effort they brought those panels to the South
African M u s e u m .
So there's a kind of irony, in a way, that amongst
the earliest ethnographic material to be brought into
the m u s e u m , what is considered to be an absolute
treasure of the m u s e u m now, it was almost done for
a different set of reasons. It wasn't that people were
really that interested in the motivation of the rock-art,
but they recognised it as being primitive in some way
and that it should be in the m u s e u m . It wasn't ethno-
graphically researched. From about the 1920's to per
haps the early 1970's most people w h o were interested
in rock art more or less interpreted it just as they saw
it. They didn't try to analyse it. It was seen as quite a
literal form of visual expression; it wasn't really seen
in terms of symbolism or cosmology."
For a further comment , E . M . Shaw's 1988 note is useful:
"For the first time a Department of Anthropology was
recognised. Peringuey promoted the collecting of
material objects from African people and for a while
had them displayed. The material culture collection,
however, had yet to receive the proper management
it required.
In the 1930's, under the direction of Dr. Leonard
Gill, the Department of Anthropology began to
diverge into two streams; prehistory and physical
anthropology together as Archaeology, and material
culture as Ethnography. A n assistant was appointed
whose first task it was to put the collection in order,
catalogue it, and arrange an ethnographic display
in the n e w extension to the building. With that in
hand, it was possible to commence programmes of
study and research, which today continue to build
up a body of information that will not be obtainable
again".7
Disciplinary lines were n o w being made more explicit.
Not surprisingly, they were also redrawn as time wore on.
Currently, for example, the archaeology and anthropol
ogy index still contains the categories "archaeology" and
"anthropology" but it also contains a category labelled
as "general". "Past h u m a n culture" and material on the
"Khoisan hunter-gatherers and pastoralists" are under
the "general" category.8
First Methods of Collection
At the start, methods of collection were mixed. M u c h of
the material collected by the first Director (Smith), for
example, went with him back to England and was sold
to defray the costs of his collection expeditions.9 The
position of supplier of artefacts to 'mother-countries'
Within those '"things", oddly enough, were several "curiosities" contributed by Captain lames
C o o k in the late 18th century. Lindsay Hooper, of the S A M , writes: "Captain Cook's vessels
called at the Cape on their forward and homeward journeys, and enjoyed an interested
and hospitable welcome. In appreciation, gifts of the rare 'curiosities' collected in the Pa
cific were given to the Governor of the Cape, V a n Plettenberg. It was Cook's intention that
these form the nucleus of a local m u s e u m , and so encourage the pursurt of knowledge at
the Cape." These gifts included carved masks, helmets, spears, a Tahitian breastplate, N e w
Zealand clubs. S o m e of these 'curiosities' were waylaid in the M u s e u m ' s m a n y early moves:
"In 1860 E . L. Layard, then Director of the South African M u s e u m , came upon one such
collection of items in the house of the sexton of the Dutch Reformed Church. They were
transferred to the M u s e u m . . . In the 1960's Professor D . Bax of the Netherlands Cultural
History Department, University of Cape T o w n , 'rediscovered' the collection in the South
African M u s e u m and recognised its historical importance." Hooper, L . (1987J "Captain
Cook's Gift to the Cape: A n Invitation to Explore a Wider World". In Sagittarius, vol.2, no. 3.
Cape T o w n : South African M u s e u m .
Sagittarius, vol. 4, no. 1.
www.museums.org.za/sam/resource/arch/archanth.htm.
E . M . Shaw writes in 1988: "Andrew Smith was often away on long exploratory journeys and
brought back large collections of cultural and natural historical material. M u c h of it had to
be sold to cover the expenses of his travels and it is not clear h o w m u c h of his material or
of the earlier collections, except that of Captain C o o k which is identifiable, remains in the
M u s e u m collection today." In Sagittarius, vol. 4, no.l.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 57
was c o m m o n for m a n y 'colonial' museums and collec
tions and w e will see a similar history in the next chapter.
M u c h of the later material was donated:
"Until the end of the nineteenth century the collection
of material culture continued to accumulate through
gifts of travellers, both local and those calling by ship
.... As was the fashion of the times, 'trophies' of weap
ons featured in the records as 'curiosities' ".10
The ethnographic collections were also affected by
Peringuey's contacts:
"Peringuey knew a lot of the French missionaries,
there were missionary bases all over the place, and
collections would come into our m u s e u m s through
these various sources".11
Again, the method of collection meant that what the
m u s e u m accumulated was likely to be part of material cul
ture rather than material more directly indicative of social
organisation or of the meanings that gave objects partic
ular significance to the groups from which they came.
The ethnographic collections were affected as well by
resources within the m u s e u m . There were, to start with,
few ethnographers at the m u s e u m . That in itself lim
ited the amount and the kind of collecting that could be
carried out:
" M y predecessor, Margaret Shaw, was the only ethno
grapher. She was appointed in 1933 and until 1962
she was the only ethnographer in the South African
M u s e u m . So w e are talking about a very small
group of people, and very little active collecting was
done. Most of the material came in through dona
tion, and you are not actually shaping the collections
terribly m u c h , you are receiving what people see fit to
give you."
For several reasons then, the emphasis fell easily on mate
rial culture rather than on the social structure of various
groups. That emphasis Davison sees as contributing in
turn to an emphasis on differences among groups rather
than similarities. Interestingly, that emphasis was in line
with the orientation of the Afrikaans language universi
ties even though the S A M in itself was not affiliated with
them:
"Right from early on, from the '30's onwards there was
a separation between the English language universi
ties approach to Anthropology and the Afrikaans
language universities. The Afrikaans universities had
something called Volkekunde which was based very
m u c h on the G e r m a n tradition. They had depart
ments which addressed ethnology, culture and race
and the difference between people."
In the English language universities, the approach of
Social Anthropology was more in vogue:
"Social Anthropology was actually looking more at
the similarities .... They were looking at the structure
of society .. . . The m u s e u m s in some ways didn't align
themselves with the Afrikaans language universities,
but in the kind of work they did .. . they were (both)
working with material culture".12
A First Divide:
Others as a Disappearing Past
All ways of thinking are marked by the presence of
divides of various kinds. W e distinguish, for example,
between self and other, between the real and the imagi
nary, between thought and action, between modern and
primitive, between black and white. Most of those divi
sions are so well-established in our minds and practices
that w e no longer recognise them as socially constructed
and as open to change. It is precisely those divisions,
however, and the practices in which they are expressed
or embodied, that some groups often seek to challenge
and change while others resist any alteration in what has
come to seem 'natural' or a matter of 'fact'.
W e shall have occasion to note several divides embed
ded in m u s e u m practices. The S A M ' s history provides
us with a first example. This consists of assigning some
groups to 'the past', perceiving change only in terms
of loss or 'disappearance' and implying that only what
once existed has value.
Patricia Davison's narrative brings out a particular
action that stemmed from this perception:
58 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
"In the 1960's ... Margaret Shaw, together with . . . the
government ethnologist, the person w h o was the
main ethnographer for the State, formed a research
project around traditional crafts. It was actually
called the Bantu Crafts Project. The word Bantu has
really got negative connotations now. Even at the
time it wasn't possibly the best one to use, but it was
basically looking at African crafts, and money was
received for that. So from the 1960's right through
to the 1980's, there was fieldwork undertaken. It was
very m u c h a kind of salvage project before it's too late,
before there are no longer people practising these
crafts. It was like what was going on in America, only
40 - 50 years later."
The project, however, had some of the same ramifica
tions that Tomaselli has noted for British documenta
ries: "while dignifying the activities of the working class,
(they) paradoxically simultaneously legitimised class
divisions".13 In the case of Shaw's project, the groupings
used reflected the same main ethnic division as those
promoted by the Nationalist Party. Patricia Davison
comments:
"It was . . . to be ... a reference study, and of course it
is, but the categories that were chosen to work within
were the very same categories that were eventually the
divisions a m o n g the different groups in South Africa
... in terms of homeland, in terms of segregation
policy. These were the seven ethnic groupings, the
language groupings of Southern Africa ... that were
used as the basis for separate development.... Within
the bigger apartheid system as a whole, the notion
of divide and rule was that if you had seven separate
nations instead of one large African national group, it
would be m u c h easier to argue for White supremacy."
The perceived need to capture black or Indigenous his
tory before it disappeared was by no means unique
to the South African M u s e u m . It appears strongly, for
example, in photographic 'records' of the kind described
in Chapter 7: photographs that were aimed at recording
dress and social life as it was felt to have been, ignor
ing current reality. It was also very m u c h present in
Australia and in the United States, especially in relation
to American Indians.14
Unique to the S A M , however, was a project involving
people once labelled as "Bushmen" (now referred to as
the / X a m or San people). I give this project some par
ticular space for two reasons referred to previously. O n e
is that the casts emerging from it played a significant
part in what made the m u s e u m attractive to m a n y and
offensive to many. The other is that this project raises
questions relevant to all m u s e u m s : W h a t is the place of
'bodies' in any m u s e u m ? H o w are they displayed? H o w
and w h y were they acquired? W h a t are the meanings
they convey to various audiences? H o w should deci
sions be made about their disposition? These are ques
tions brought up again in Section D of this chapter. I
foreshadow them here, however, because in the case of
the S A M interest in 'bodies' began with a sense of the
need for records before 'disappearance'.
Concern for a record of the "Bushmen" started
with a focus on language and folklore. The work was
undertaken, to draw from Gerald Klinghardt's account,
by scholars outside the S A M : "Dr. Wilhelm Bleek, a
Prussian linguist, and his sister-in-law M s . Lucy
Lloyd".15 Later, concern focused on the possible physi
cal disappearance of the "Bushmen", at least as "pure
types". To continue with Klinghardt's account, Louis
Peringuey initiated in 1906 the making of plaster casts
as a way of preserving a physical record. These 200 plas
ter casts were moulded, in pieces, on the bodies of liv
ing people, people chosen as representative of "the way
Bushmen were":
" S o m e of the people w h o had been Dr. Bleek's inform
ants in his Khoi-San language studies were traced
by M s Dorothea Bleek, Dr. Bleek's daughter. They
were living on the outskirts of Prieska in the north
ern Cape, and had become shepherds and labourers
1 0 M .
Patricia Davison. 12 M .
Tomaselli, K . (1996). Appropriating Images: The Semiotics of Visual Representation. Hojberg:
Intervention Press, p. 162.
See, for example the Smithsonian Institution: wwff.nmnh.si.edu/anthro/repatriation/pagel.
htm.
This and the comments in the next four paragraphs are from Gerald Klinghardt, H u m a n Sci
ences Division, (1998): See http:www.museums.org.za/sam/resource/arch/bushman.htm.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 59
on farms, or were working as servants in the village
.. . M s Bleek identified some of these people as 'pure
Cape Bushmen ' on the basis of their language and
physical features."
The cast pieces (arms, legs, heads etc.) were then assem
bled and displayed, at first as single standing pieces.
"In early exhibitions the casts were used to illustrate
the typical physical characteristics of 'Bushmen ' as a
primitive anthropological type occupying a low posi
tion on the evolutionary scale. In the 1930s the fig
ures were grouped according to geographical region
and language, in an attempt to demonstrate theoreti
cal links between physical type, language and culture
With the construction of the diorama in 1959/60
the figures were placed in a natural setting in a scene
representing the way of life of 'Cape Bushmen ' in the
early 19th century".16
In this diorama (the Bushman diorama), the setting was
one of a hunter-gatherers' camp-site. Preserved then,
and presented without comment , was an image of a way
of life that had long disappeared, without any indica
tion of current ways of life or of the wars with advancing
colonists and with other African groups that had led to
declining numbers and status.
1964: Dividing People by N a m e
and By Building
All societies make distinctions among people. So also do
museums . It is not simply the presence of distinctions
that attracts attention in museums , however, but the
particular ways in which they are expressed. Dividing
people along some points of 'progress', for example, is
readily implied in ways ranging from "the evolutionary
sequence of objects (that) illustrates the triumphs of
invention and discovery, to military museums where the
cases of uniforms and armour exemplify the nation's tri
u m p h s of arms".17
Most people, not surprisingly, seek to perceive them
selves as members of some larger group that they admire
or to place themselves at some satisfying point along a
historical line. Historically, for example, they m a y see
themselves as a natural extension of some grand past,
as always improving, or as rising phoenix-like from
a record of oppression: always survivors. Again, the
interesting questions revolve around the choice of links
to the past and the ways in which these are expressed
within m u s e u m s . O f interest also are the ways in which
some awkward parts of the past are dealt with. H o w
can one claim some parts of the past and disclaim or
ignore others?
The S A M provides examples of h o w one m u s e u m
proceeded. I take as a start an early m o v e noted by
Patricia Davison in the museum's Annual Reports:
"I've had quite a close look at this ... certainly the
anthropology collections moved from being in the
Annual Report. They had the works of civilised races
and the works of uncivilised races and then some
times the works of uncivilised races would be identi
fied basically as "West and the rest'."
Verbally separating some parts of a museum's collection
into categories such as 'the rest', 'general', or 'miscellan
eous' is certainly one way of segregating areas or people
that are felt to form no pleasing unity with 'the main col
lections'. The S A M also moved, however, toward physi
cally separating some parts of h u m a n history from others.
Before 1964, the S A M housed both the natural his
tory collections and what came to be called the cultural
history collections. Black and white cultural history,
however, were segregated in 1964. In that year, a decision
was made to move the 'cultural history' collections to a
separate building. Natural history - including ethnog
raphy and therefore black cultural history - remained
at the initial site. The cultural history collections, or
the historical collections as they were also called, were
moved to the old Slave Lodge (the n a m e dates from the
building's earlier use by the Dutch East India C o m
pany). This building had once been occupied (in 1825)
by the S A M and the Public Library, and had recently
been vacated by the Supreme Court. The n e w m u s e u m
was given the n a m e : the South African Cultural History
M u s e u m ( S A C H M ) .
The objects that moved were "all the classical col
lections, Greek and R o m a n antiquities, all the colo
nial history collections." The move was not, however,
60 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
completely along lines of Whites versus 'the rest'. Col
lections that related to Cape Malays were moved to
the S A C H M , only to be separated later with the crea
tion of the 'Malay' Bo-Kaap m u s e u m - a satellite of the
S A C H M . Black or Indigenous history remained within
the natural history museum. 1 8
Within the S A C H M , the layout of the cultural his
tory collections reinforced the split between white
and black history and the setting aside of black his
tory. The viewer could walk through the collections in
a seemingly 'chronological' pattern - starting with the
ancient civilisations of Greece and Egypt and progress
ing through Europe, particularly Northern Europe, and
finally arriving at colonised Cape T o w n . By default,
Black African history was then not presented as playing
a part in the formation of modern day Cape T o w n .
The way in which material was displayed was also
divisive. European cultural history was displayed in
glass-cases on pedestals. African cultural history was
presented in its 'natural habitat' e.g. baskets on the
floor. These differences in display suggest a difference
in value.
The S A M web-pages note that the division between
Black African cultural history and 'the rest' has been
both criticised (as one more expression of apartheid)
and defended (again with reference to the diorama) on
the grounds that "its presence in the S A M affirms the
importance of the San as the first people of South Africa
and gives recognition to their way of life".19
Patricia Davison sees the division as presenting a
strange view of history and as being responsive to Afri
kaners' concern about being underrepresented:
"At the ... time, you had this large group of Afrikaner
Nationalists, w h o were very proud of their herit
age, and they wanted in Cape T o w n the equivalent
of a m u s e u m like the Afrikaner M u s e u m in
Johannesburg. There was no m u s e u m in Cape T o w n
that dealt with Afrikaner history. There were one or
two in Stellenbosch, but they felt that this was a big
gap. So n o w w e had the old Supreme Court building
... and there was this emphasis that it should some
h o w correct the balance ... in the newspaper . . . peo
ple were saying 'African history has got more space in
our museums than Afrikaner history'. At that time
there wasn't anybody saying 'isn't it revealing that
African history should be with natural history'. That
became the real criticism."
A further consequence, Davison notes, was the reinforce
ment of an object-focused view of history, without atten
tion to social history. In the new S A C H M , as in the S A M :
"It tended to be cultural history as practised again in
the Afrikaans language universities. It was very m u c h
object-focused. So it would focus on the Cape chair
or the Cape silver or the Cape glass. It was focused on
the object without making a link to the social history
of the people."
1980's: Separation by Governance
"The Cultural History M u s e u m , if w e could jump to
the '8o's, was suddenly becoming very m u c h - becom
ing overtly, politically - a White m u s e u m . W e had
a very bizarre change in our politics. We 've always
had a Parliament which was Whites only. In the
early 1980's w e had something called the Tricameral
Parliament. They had a House for White people, a
House for Coloured people and a House for Indian
people. There wasn't a House for Black people. It was
considered to be an advance at the time. There was a
lot of opposition to it, but when the Tricameral House
came in the '8o's, the three different parliaments took
responsibility for different cultural institutions and
the Cultural History M u s e u m fell under this White,
what they called, O w n Affairs. It was very bizarre".20
The separation became more marked still with a shift
in Directors at the Cultural History M u s e u m from one
According to Klinghardt "the diorama was planned by the then Museum Ethnologist, Miss
E . M . Shaw, with the Director, Dr. W . Crompton, and was built by the technical staff".
Davison, G . (2001) "National Museums in a Global Age: Observations Abroad and Reflec
tions at Home". In Mclntyre, D . andWehner, K . (Eds. I National Museums: Negotiating His
tories. Conference Proceedings. Canberra: National Museum of Australia, p. 14.
The "Cape Malays" were predominantly slaves brought in by the Dutch East India Company.
They came from a variety of countries in which the Dutch East India Company traded.
Through work in ports, many of them had a version of Malay as their c o m m o n language. A
further similarity was that the majority were Muslim.
www.museums.org.za/sam/resource/arch/bushdebate.htm.
Patricia Davison.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 6l
w h o tried to work against the division to one w h o saw
the S A C H M as meant to cover Afrikaner history only. To
take up a further part of Patricia Davison's narrative:
"I joined the Cultural History M u s e u m in about 1972
or '73 and at that time our Director was a Swiss, Dr
Wolfgang Schneiman . . . . H e couldn't accept this
division between the South African M u s e u m and
the Cultural History M u s e u m , and he collected ...
Tibetan things and .. . ancient Persian things . . . .
There were difficulties because the Board of Trustees
couldn't control him like they wanted to. H e was
nearing retirement age and he announced his wish to
retire. H e said that he would stay on a year to train
the next Director, but the Council couldn't get rid of
him fast enough ...
Well, the next Director was someone with a mili
tary history, not history but military background,
naval background actually and ... his deputy was
someone with a defence force background. Then all
these eccentric foreigners were got rid of, and a very
particular type of person was focused on as a staff
m e m b e r N o matter h o w m u c h I spoke and said
'Look, these are the collections, and w e need to think
about ways of talking about the collections w e have in
a different way and certainly not doing this mechani
cal story' " (this 'mechanical walk' through Greece
and R o m e etc.), "I couldn't get through. It was too
frustrating and I decided that I needed to leave the
m u s e u m . "
Clearly w e need to look at the roles of particular individ
uals within m u s e u m s , and the agency or lack of agency at
the level of Directors, as well as the challenges that c o m e
from broader changes in society.
Perceptions of the S A M in the 1980s:
Politically Neutral?
The previous section m a y suggest that contest occurred
only within the m u s e u m or between m u s e u m staff and
Afrikaner groups. Protest against the Afrikaner govern
m e n t was, however, becoming widespread, prompting
the question: Once protest begins against a regime, where
do museums stand? Are they the targets of protest? The
sites of protest? Are some more the targets or the sites of
protest than others are? H o w do differences c o m e about?
D o these perceptions of m u s e u m s influence change?
Being perceived as politically neutral, for example, might
m a k e the need for change less obvious.
In the 1980's, Davison c o m m e n t s , "all were in protest
m o d e " and s o m e of that protest was directed toward the
m u s e u m s . "Even within the m u s e u m fraternity, there
was quite a lot of opposition directed at the Art Gallery".
(It was seen as showing only "fine art" in European
idioms - later it played a role at the forefront of change
within m u s e u m s in Iziko). " T h e S A C H M became
increasingly seen as part of apartheid although all the
m u s e u m s were seen, in s o m e ways, as establishments".
T h e S A M attracted the least protest at this time. That
was , Davison suggests, perhaps because of its physical
position (being part of the non-segregated C o m p a n y
Gardens) and perhaps because of its contents and its
past:
" T h e South African M u s e u m had its roots w a y back
in the previous century ... perceptions about it were
that it was an interesting place that didn't deal with
political issues. It had never been segregated. It never
ever had separate entrances. It never closed to anyone
. . . . It had a reputation that it was not overtly politi
cised."
Nonetheless, Davison continues, "right through the '80s
... there was a growing awareness that m u s e u m s simply
had to change". T h e changes of government in 1993/1994
and the White Paper in 1996 added to that awareness.
N o w the challenge became, to use one of Davison's ques
tions: " W h a t do you do to signal change, to m a k e people
say, 'yes, this is different'?"
If change is the issue - and changes are the focus of
the next section - w h y consider the history of a m u s e u m
as w e have done? It is important to look at the reasons
for the establishment of m u s e u m s - reasons such as the
enlightenment of the colony with science bringing with
it a n e w form of 'civilisation'. This understanding of a
m u s e u m leads to particular types of collections and dis
plays - a predominance of European materials displayed
with reverence, a 'scientific' approach that e m p h a
sises collections of similar objects rather than looking
62 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "•" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
at broader cultural connections between dissimilar
objects. These general tendencies in colonial m u s e u m s
led in the South African context to a particular division
and presentation of 'European' and 'European Cape
Townian' vs. 'Black African' cultural history.
Challenges to these divisions and forms of display
must be placed in relation to existing inertia or forms of
self-understanding within the m u s e u m s themselves.
C. After 1994: Changes Called For,
Made, Or Planned
The aim in this volume is not only to gain a sense of
events at particular museums but also to build toward
ways of analysing challenge and change that can be car
ried from one m u s e u m to another, helping to specify
both what is being called for and what might be done.
The m u s e u m that is the focus for this chapter - the
S A M - provides first of all a base for delineating the
nature and sources of calls for change: a critical first
step toward asking what moves toward change the S A M
has made or has considered making. W e have seen, for
example, that calls for change were coming from sec
tions of the m u s e u m staff and, more strongly, from
members of once-suppressed political parties w h o saw
change within m u s e u m s as part of a broader m o v e
toward nation-building, toward the goals of access,
redress, and participation.
W e have seen also that there were likely to be several
constraints on change. Within the m u s e u m , a great deal
was already established: staff, collections, accepted prac
tices, audiences with expectations based on past knowl
edge of the m u s e u m . Within the government, con
straints came particularly in the form of the goals that
w e saw most explicitly in Chapter 2. The n e w changes
were to take place within a general push toward the
growth of the economy and toward m u s e u m s receiving
less rather than more government funding.
The picture up to this point, however, has allowed
for only two main voices, for only two major stakehold
ers: m u s e u m staff and people in government positions,
either in the old Afrikaner-dominated government or
in the emerging African National Congress. After 1994,
however, the calls for change were marked as well by the
emergence of a n e w voice. This was the voice of a spe
cific group. This was the Khoi-San - the 'first people' in
the area - and m a n y of their concerns were particularly
relevant to practices at the S A M .
T w o steps then are called for in this section. The first
is to detail the emergence of a stronger Khoi-San voice
and its objectives. The second is to develop a list of calls
for change that combines the Khoi-San objectives with
objectives that have come from other 'first people' or
minority groups. The response of the S A M will then be
detailed in relation to each one of this amalgamated set.
Emerging in the Calls for Change:
A Stronger Khoi-San Voice
The people represented in the S A M by the plaster casts
made in the 1920's are part of the Khoi-San group. The
year 1995 saw one conference involving the Khoi-San.
This was a gathering that centred around an exhibition
presented at the Art Gallery and featuring copies of the
S A M ' s casts. That exhibition and the debate it aroused
are dealt with more fully in Chapter 7. Here I shall say
only that the exhibit (labelled Miscast) was regarded
by its curator as a critical comment on South Africa's
approach to its 'first people' but was perceived by m a n y
others as indicative of a continuing lack of respect.
The year 1997 saw a conference on Khoisan Identities
and Cultural Heritage, and the year 2001 a National
Khoisan Consultative Conference on Khoisan Diversity.
I give particular space to the 2001 conference, in large
Besten, M . and Bredekamp, H . C . (2001) "Report on the National Khoisan Consultative
Conference (NKCC)" at Urgent Anthropology www.und.ac.za/und/ccms/anfhropology/ur-
gent/khoisan2.htm.
The several papers presented strike a chord with the concerns expressed among many Indig
enous groups. A m o n g the papers were:
Three on religious beliefs and practices - e.g. Brink on the rites of passage and marriage
practices demonstrating that "the Khoisan and the San people had culture long before the
Europeans came to South Africa".
A set on the presence of indigenous law, developed to a point that would justify granting
Khoisan law the status of a traditional authority.
• Three on representations of the Khoi-San in the media (e.g. Tomaselli on film; and the
discussant - Zenzile Khoisan - "criticized conceptions of Khoisan that limit them to remote
areas").
A set on land rights, and a further set of indigenous knowledge systems and issues of copy
right.
A call m two papers for particular attention to the representation and position of Khoi-San
women.
C H A L L E N G E A N D T R A N S F O R M A T I O N "^ M U S E U M S IN CAPE T O W N A N D S Y D N E Y 63
part because the report issued after the conference makes
explicit an orientation toward the previous conference
and a set of objectives for the representation of the Khoi-
San in all forms of media.21
T h e criticisms of the earlier conferences revolve
around issues of ownership and being an object of study
rather than the subject. In the earlier conferences, the
report c o m m e n t s , "papers were delivered primarily by
white academics". In contrast, this conference " w a s a
display of Khoisan intellect and beliefs". T h e audience
was also different. T h e 2001 conference attracted a large
and predominantly Khoi-San audience ("500 people
of w h o m 441 were delegates from 36 Khoisan c o m m u
nities and organizations and from various regions of
South Africa").22
T h e past ownership of knowledge about the Khoi-
San was n o w challenged:
"Khoisan studies, and Khoisan representations gener
ally, are . . . areas dominated by individuals w h o are
not Khoisan. T h e Khoisan are thus still very m u c h
an object/subject study and representation by people
w h o are not Khoisan. A resurgence in Khoisan iden
tity, greater interest in Khoisan history and culture by
individuals of Khoisan descent, and drives towards
e m p o w e r m e n t ... m a y alter the scholarly field and
the arena of representation".23
A larger set of objectives was proposed by Martin van Zyl,
standing in for the Premier of his province (the Northern
Cape) . A m o n g these aims was a state of affairs in which:
• T h e Khoi-San gained recognition at the highest level of
government as the first inhabitants of South Africa;
• T h e Khoi-San's resistance against oppression and
colonisation w a s recognised; and
• The Khoi-San people played a part in the redefinition
of their role and identity.
M o r e detailed still is the set of resolutions passed at a m e
eting held at the end of the conference by "official and
associate delegates".24 I select from these the recom
mendations that had espcially to do with representation
and the S A M :
"3.1 that Khoisan languages and history be included
in the school curricula
5.2 that urgent negotiations with the R S A govern
m e n t be entered into on the repatriation of Sarah
Baar tman as well as other Khoisan h u m a n remains
5.3 that following the closure of the San diorama
at the SA Museum, a consultative process with the
affected Khoisan groups be established and imple
mented
7.1 that all filmed and visual materials shot on
location in Khoisan communities involving them
and derived from their stories, folklore and involving
property or resources of the Khoisan be financially
compensated for
7.4 that negative perceptions resulting from propa
ganda, distortions and outright fabrications ... be
challenged and corrected
11 that our cultural and intellectual property be
protected through copyright".25
In one final m o v e toward restrictions o n ownership, the
conference resolved that "only the interpretation of the
Chairperson of the ... Council, M r Cecil Le Fleur, or that
of the Patron of the Conference process, regarding any
of the above-stated Resolutions will be regarded as the
official viewpoint of the .. . Conference." T h e Patron was
Professor Jatti Bredekamp, the Director of the Institute
for Historical Research at the University of the Western
Cape. (Historically, this University is m o r e a 'black' Uni
versity than the 'white' University of Cape T o w n ) . Profes
sor Bredekamp is currently C E O of Iziko M u s e u m s .
These resolutions were interlaced, as the inclusion of
'National' in the title of the conference suggests, with
resolutions and statements to the effect that the over
riding goal was one of building toward national unity.
T h e report notes, however, that the statements "gener
ating great applause" were "assertions about e m p o w
erment ... (and) affirmation of the Khoisan as a first
indigenous people/nation (volk)".26
H o w are such calls for change represented in the
actions taken or planned by the S A M ? T o frame that
question, I shall amalgamate several of the Khoi-San
concerns with s o m e contained in objections from Indig
enous groups in other countries.
64 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
A First Delineation of Indigenous Calls for
Change and some S A M Responses
Areas of challenge that are especially likely to come from
Indigenous groups can be grouped into three sets. The
first set covers objections to being relegated to the past
and to a 'simple' life. This set covers (1) W e are not dead,
extinct, or relevant only to the past; (2) Our relevance is
not only to remote or rural areas; and (3) W e were not
lacking in creativity, complexity of thought or complex
ity in action.
A second set focuses more on being in the position of
subject rather than object, with that position involving
aspects of ownership. This set covers (4) W e are not to
be considered dehumanised objects of study; (5) Return
what belongs to us: the bodies of our people, our reli
gious symbols; and (6) The new narratives should be
'our' stories, not simply yours (your discoveries etc.).
The final pair typically occur at a later point, after
m u s e u m s have begun to m o v e toward displays that
contain expanded or 'improved' representations of
Indigenous peoples. Covered are (7) The n e w narra
tives should acknowledge diversity a m o n g us but not
use your categories; and (8) The n e w narratives should
acknowledge past injustices but avoid n e w essentialising
and new simplicities.
With that list in hand, let us see h o w the S A M has
moved toward responding to the several objections or is
considering moving.
1. W e are not 'dead', 'extinct', or relevant
only to the past
To meet this challenge, the displays to avoid are those
that present 'the other' as belonging only to the past
and as unchanging. The S A M , like m a n y natural his
tory museums , was not well placed to meet this chal
lenge. These m u s e u m s typically place their emphasis on
what is 'old'. The S A M website27 tells us, for example, that
the m u s e u m houses fossils that are 400 million years old
and the only model of the extinct quagga. The aim m a y
be to represent 'African culture over the last 2 million
years'. Within the m u s e u m at the time of challenges from
the Khoi-San, however, there was little indication of the
present. The picture offered was also static, with little
indication of the major changes that were taking place
or had already taken place at the time images of a sim
ple rural life were constructed (changes such as urban
migration, for example, or the draining-off of m e n to
work in the mines).
The S A M m a d e some immediate changes relevant
to this kind of call for change. Davison describes, for
example, the addition of a statement at the entrance
to the ethnographic gallery, stating that the focus on
traditional crafts presented the people as being 'frozen
in time' and that this would be readdressed in a reor
ganisation of the gallery. H u n g in 1994 as a stop-gap
measure, it was still there in November 2001 while other
reorganisations and administrative structural changes
were being made .
A further stop-gap measure was the inclusion of
photographs of people from the differing tribes in
contemporary settings and with responsible positions.
These photographs were taped to the glass-cases which
enclosed the plaster casts with their traditional material
cultures.28 Patricia Davison notes again that this action
is a small first step:
"That out-of-touch display" (the photographs showing
contemporary people) "was done by a student, w h o
was working with m e as a volunteer and he just did it
really quickly, and as you can see, it's not properly lit.
It was done very m u c h as a student project. The con
cept was nice, but it wasn't given the full backing of
the designers - he did it himself, basically. H e didn't
have anybody to help."
A third m o v e into the present was a collection of "politi
cal posters and other ephemera":
" M a n y m u s e u m s did this, and w e did it quite actively
from 1994, but w e haven't accessioned them fully
ibid." www.und.ac.za/und/ccms/anthropology/urgent/khoisan.htm.
ibid. Emphasis added.
! 6 Besten, M . and Bredekamp, H . C . (2001 ) Op.cit.
www.museums.org.za/sam/exh/experm.htm.
Note: this move is similar to the opening space of Australian Museum's Indigenous Austra
lians Gallery in which photographs of Aboriginals of stature - judges, educators etc. are
hung (Chapter 4).
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <+> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 65
into our permanent collections because they are
ephemeral, and they're going to fade or disintegrate
quite soon. Other m u s e u m s m a y be more appropri
ate places to keep those things in perpetuity. They've
been very useful for short-term exhibitions and we've
sent some off to the Smithsonian for their 'African
Voices' exhibit."
Longer-term is an organisational move that was aimed
at ending the divide between 'natural' and 'cultural' his
tory and at the placement of 'black history' exclusively
in a natural history m u s e u m . This was the appointment
of Patricia Davison as Director of Social History within
Iziko. She was charged especially with mending the
divide and welcomed the task:
"The best thing, from m y point of view, was break
ing d o w n the division between cultural history
and anthropology. Probably w h y I've ended up in
this position of being Director of Social History, is
because I've had a long-term commitment to inte
grating those two parts of our collections. It offers
a huge opportunity to really do projects that draw on
our collections in a completely different way ... m o v
ing in a direction that w e haven't actually explored
before".
That direction covers both cutting across historical peri
ods and moving into the present. O n the first of these
aims:
"There are a number of challenges about h o w w e
would, in a sense, try to communicate about the
archaeological past The one thing that w e never
did fully was really link the rock art to the ethnogra
phy, although they were in adjacent galleries. It was
never really clear that the very same people that had
produced this wonderful body of art were the people
that you were seeing in the ethnography gallery."
For the second aim (moving more into the present),
there is the challenge of h o w to move away from the tra
ditional focus of historical m u s e u m s on objects, ignor
ing other ways of indicating h o w people live and what is
significant to them. From Patricia Davison:
" W e will find ways of having a more multi-vocal inter
pretation. Whether this involves having an oral his
tory archive rather than actual objects, that m a y well
be part of a n e w commitment. We're interested in
music and sound generally, and photographs —we've
got a huge collection of photographs that nobody has
researched".29
2. O u r relevance is not simply to remote, or rural
areas but also to m o d e r n Africa
O n e way to set people apart from each other is to assign
them separate spaces. Within museums, they m a y occupy
different sections, with no connecting links. Less obvi
ously, separateness can be conveyed by creating a nar
rative that describes people in terms of self-contained
and apparently self-sufficient lives. ' M y ' farmhouse, for
instance, as w e shall see in Chapter 5, is presented as a
self-sufficient entity, with no indication of the workers
w h o made the house or the farm possible. 'Your' way of
life is presented as having no overlaps with mine, even
though the two have been interwoven from an early
stage.
The life-styles presented by the h u m a n figures in the
S A M , to take a further example, are exclusively rural
and remote. Here are only activities such as hunting,
gathering, herding, or small-scale agriculture. There is
no indication of urban migration or of the movement
of m e n into mining areas. Nor is there any indication
of hardship or effort. This is not only a rural life but an
idyllic rural life, setting it even further apart from life
as the viewer might k n o w it. The end-result is not only
a strengthening of 'us' and 'them' distinctions, but also
an exclusion of Black African history from Cape and
Afrikaner history.
Short of aiming at a new exhibition that would offer
a re-vision of the whole of South African history, what
might be done?
O n e solution, Patricia Davison suggests, would be
to focus the re-shaping on a history of Cape T o w n itself,
using that as a base for a more multi-faceted and gap-
filling history (including slave history):
"We 've got a project to workshop the overall Iziko
(complex) and look at where w e would show ... the
66 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <»• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
social history of Cape T o w n , and South Africa would
be an extension. Because Cape T o w n was the earlier
settlement, it's a good focus."
That kind of re-organisation would not exclude images
of rural activity. It would, however, place those activities
within Cape T o w n rather than in some remote area. Dav
ison offers as a concrete example a mat house (a full-size
model of the type of portable shelter constructed by Khoi-
San herders) that is currently in the ethnographic collec
tion: " w e might bring that d o w n because there are lots of
drawings of those sorts of mat houses on the slopes of
Table Mountain. It's very m u c h part of Cape Town".
3. W e were not lacking in creativity, or complexity of
thought or complexity of action, even in 'the far past'
The images to avoid in this case are those that invite the
adjective 'primitive'. More positively, representations
should highlight the presence of complexity, depth and
subtlety in activities and creative works. Within the
S A M , the m o v e toward a non-primitive image is partly
covered by the plan to link the rock art to the h u m a n
ethnography. It is linked also to the emphasis, in the
text dealing with the Linton slab, on the ways in which
the mixing of animal and h u m a n features within the
figures depicted on the slab is not an 'error'. The mixing
is instead a way of depicting the ability of shamans to
move across the usual barriers between the material and
spiritual worlds and intercede on behalf of their people,
with trance states part of that barrier-crossing. In effect,
here is a complex religious representation rather than
decoration, fantasy, or 'primitive drawing'.30
Longer-term is Patricia Davison's interest in high
lighting indigenous-knowledge: "I feel we've got that
opportunity, particularly around issues of story-telling,
around issues of traditional medicine and traditional
healing. There's a lot of indigenous knowledge".31
Long-term is also Davison's plan to highlight the sig
nificance of archaeological findings that point to early
permanent settlements, to people engaging not simply
in hunting-gathering, or herding, but also in commerce:
"There were lots of myths about the arrival of African
people. That's w h y archaeology became important: to
show that ... for the past 2000 years there have been
African people, African agriculturists here . . . that
was certainly not in the school textbooks. W e had
Khoi-San people here long before that - 20,000 years
at least - but I 'm talking about the African agricultur
ists w h o would be settled people rather than nomadic
people. It's very difficult in archaeological records
to pick up pastoralists because they move , because
they don't m a k e permanent settlements ... (but) the
m o m e n t you start to build a walled settlement - and
there are lots of them - there are wonderful studies
done with aerial photography on the Highveld where
you can see these great circles that were the cattle
buyers' and other enclosures . . . it's a very big source
of data n o w . There are about 100 sites that pre-date
1000 A D . "
Such evidence, Davison comments, presents a compel
ling challenge to "the idea that it was an empty land
and that people from other parts of the world just came
along, and there weren't any inhabitants."
4 . W e should not be treated as dehumanised objects
of study
O n e of the constant difficulties in m u s e u m presentations
about 'other' people is that they are treated as objects:
objects to be looked at, inspected, marvelled at. That sta
tus m a y be underlined still further by the arranged gazes
of 'others'. The figures w e look at m a y never 'look us in
the eye' (the figures in the S A M all look elsewhere) or -
again as in some of the earlier arrangements in the S A M
- m a y be looked at through the windows of a diorama.32
Chapter 7 includes one example of re-use of photographs in the South African National
Gallery (the S A N G ) Lines of Sight exhibition in 1999.
van Rijssen, W . ( 1990) "Images from the Spirit World: The Paintings on the Linton Stone". In
Sagittarius vol.5, no.l. Cape Town: South African Museum.
Patricia Davison was also responsible for a project by the S A M aimed at "increasing pub
lic awareness of indigenous knowledge in southern Africa, and showing the relationship
between scientific and indigenous knowledge". Davison, P. (1998) "Exploring Indigenous
Knowledge". In MuseNews vol.12, no. 12 Cape Town: South African Museum.
~ Patricia Davison describes an earlier organisation of the diorama: "At the moment, if you
were able to see it, it is one big open panorama, with glass from one side to the other. W h e n
it first opened it had three windows . . . they were quite deep, you could almost sit in these
windows."
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 67
Photographs can avoid part of that problem, in the
sense that they offer more accepted scope for a direct
gaze at the person creating the image. A larger part
of the problem, however, m a y be the very placement
of narratives about people within a natural history
m u s e u m . Patricia Davison cites the early criticism of
the S A M by Kenneth Hudson that was quoted at the
start of this chapter:
" H e wrote a very critical piece about the South African
M u s e u m ... he said that African people were treated
in m u c h the same way as butterflies and birds, clas
sified from the White perspective and presented as if
they were natural history specimens."
H o w is this problem to be avoided? Davison proposes
over time a separation in space:
" W e will take ethnography out of the South African
M u s e u m completely so you won't have that connec
tion with natural history . . . . Ethnography in the
old sense - that whole gallery - will be discarded ...
relocated to other sites within Iziko."
This does not mean , however, a new and artificial separa
tion between h u m a n history and natural history:
"I feel quite strongly that it would be wrong to take
h u m a n beings out of natural history. We 've only had
some h u m a n beings and that association is what is
unacceptable. So w e . . . deal with bigger issues. W e
are interested in h u m a n origins, all humans , not just
some, and w e are interested also in asking the ques
tion ' W h a t does it m e a n to be h u m a n ? ' "
Those larger questions, however, still need to be linked to
the existing strengths of the S A M and the possibilities it
offers:
"The South African M u s e u m is predominantly natu
ral history and it's also got a planetarium. W e could
do the origins of life, w e could do the origins of the
Universe, w e can take on those big themes."
The aim would then be to:
"acknowledge that knowledge is cultural, that natural
history is a discipline with its o w n history .... O n e
can start to show that are different ways of looking
at the natural world .... Scientists look at things like
whales and dolphins and whatever from a taxonomic
point of view, from a bio-diversity point of view. You
m a y well find that if you ask a local person h o w they
have understood these things, it would be enriching."
5. Return what is sacred to us: the bodies of our
people, our secret/sacred objects
Museums are by nature 'collectors', with usually more
concern with what is important to them than what is
important to the people w h o have produced the collecta-
bles. The collecting m a y be justified by regarding oneself
as more likely to take good care of the items involved
than the original owners are likely to do, especially over
time. Often, however, the interest of the m u s e u m in
building for itself an interesting picture of other areas or
other groups is accepted as sufficient rationale.
O n that kind of basis, m u s e u m s have often come to
hold both objects that were part of religious ceremonies
and not meant to be displayed outside of these ceremo
nies (these are the objects often called 'secret/sacred').
M u s e u m s have also, stemming especially from the times
when physical differences between people were taken as
a marker of evolutionary status, collected bodies.
Within South Africa the more marked source of
concern has been with the return of body parts. (Secret/
sacred objects are more prominent in relation to A b o
riginal objects held by the Australian M u s e u m : Chapter
4).
The early focus of attention was on the remains of
Sarah (or Saartje) Baartman from the National Musée
de l ' H o m m e in Paris: the iconic case noted in Chapter 1.
The return of Baartman's remains was a high-attention
claim within South Africa and its return was picked up
internationally.33
Emerging more recently is concern with the pres
ence of skeletal Khoi-San remains in the S A M itself. A
report in the South African Sunday Times34, for exam
ple, describes Griqua Chief S a m m y Jansen as saying
that "Saartje Baartman is only the beginning of the
story ... . W e want to bury our people". The report cites
68 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ov MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
also (i) statements by another m e m b e r of the Univer
sity of Western Cape's History Department (Professor
Martin Legassick) to the effect that there are at least 788
skeletal remains in the South African M u s e u m in Cape
T o w n ( "museums are stalling" he says, in their response
to calls for repatriation), and (2) statements by Patricia
Davison to the effect that one critical aim is the avoid
ance of mistakes in attributing skeletal remains to par
ticular people or to particular regions:
"The mania for collecting Khoi-san skeletons was
part of racial studies, said Davison, which became
discredited by World W a r T w o . . . T h e cataloguing
system (is a problem) ... sometimes one bone has
its o w n catalogue n u m b e r ... T h e research involves
going through m u s e u m correspondence and match
ing remains to areas, and then to descendants or
wider groupings ... eleven sets of remains . . . from
northern Namaqua land have been identified, and the
researcher is consulting people of Khoisan ancestry in
the area to decide what form of burial they would like
. . . . Y o u don't need an act of Parliament as in Sarah
Baartman's case ... said Davison, but you do need 'a
rigorous process' to avoid misidentification."
The S A M , like other m u s e u m s proceeding carefully in
the matching of bodies to areas and people, clearly has a
long-term task to undertake.
6. T h e n e w narratives should be 'ours',
not simply 'yours'
A classic feature to m a n y m u s e u m s is that the stories they
tell tend to be stories about one group told by others: by
the colonisers, the 'discoverers', the interpreting anthro
pologists, the 'rescuing recorders of a disappearing past'.
Authorship is seldom shared with, or placed in the hands
of, the people being talked about. T h e voice is that of the
donor, the curator w h o has put the exhibition together,
the collector, the intrepid traveller w h o left to discover
u n k n o w n or little k n o w n places, returning with objects
to sell, display, or give as gifts.
Does the nature of authorship matter? To take s o m e
consequences:
• T h e people discovered are often transformed in the
process. Knut Dahl, to take a Norwegian example,
transformed the Aboriginal people he me t into
savages and cannibals to highlight his o w n courage
and the dangers he met.35
• T h e people represented, w h e n they become audiences
or viewers for this material, find only others' narratives,
others' images of themselves.
• T h e narratives get in the w a y of any direct knowledge
of the 'other'.
• In between are the narratives told by people about
their encounters, typically past. To take an Australian
example again - the words are Marcia Langton's
-"Australians do not k n o w and relate to Aboriginal
people. They relate to stories told by former
colonists".36
H o w are m u s e u m s to rise to such problems? O n e fre
quent response - as w e shall see in several chapters - is to
involve communities in the development of n e w centres
or n e w exhibitions.
A second w a y is to ask, as Patricia Davison has sug
gested, about the local interpretation and understand
ing of events. That kind of route would allow natural
history to emerge as in itself cultural history, situated in
changing understanding and interpretations, with tra
ditional African understanding cast as expertise.
Another w a y - if one focuses on ethnography - is to
m o v e toward oral history, abandoning the traditional
focus on history told by w a y of material objects. N o w
the approach shifts toward including voices from m e m
bers of the communi ty , talking about their links to the
past, their o w n life experiences, and/or their encoun
ters with representations of themselves (an example
appears in the next section of this chapter, in the form
of Abdullah Ibrahim's sense as a child that the casts
These included Time Europe's April 22, 2002 issue, The Scotsman's January 30, 2002 edition
and Africa News May 4, 2002. I use the term "success" with some reservations, given the
questions raised in some newspaper articles as to whether the National Musée de l 'Homme
in Paris had been able to be sure that the body parts returned could be specifically identified
as those of Baartman: e.g. The Scotsman.
Sunday Times, May 5, 2002.
Dahl, K . (1942) Blant Australias Villmenn. (Amongst Australia's savages). Oslo: J.W. Cap-
pelens Forlag.
Langton, M . (1993) Well, I Heard it on the Radio and J Saw it on the Television. Sydney:
Australian Film Commission, p.33.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "»• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 69
were of actual people, 'stuffed' like other exhibits in the
m u s e u m ) .
This route w e shall see more fully utilised for the
m o m e n t in other m u s e u m s (e.g. Chapter 4), and I shall
consider its use more fully there. For the m o m e n t , I
note a further possibility considered for the S A M . This
is to add to the diorama, if it reappears, an account of
the debate about its creation and its closure. Patricia
Davison:
" W h a t one has to do, I think, is document the proc
ess, document the discussion around those issues and
actually include the debate in the display in some
way, either through audio-visual means and, if w e re
open, change the whole context in which the diorama
is seen."
That move , however - to anticipate a difficulty that
emerges in Chapter 7 in relation to an exhibition at the
Art Gallery - m a y in itself be seen as maintaining the
privileged status of one group's narratives, with 'the
other' still placed as an object of study.
7. T h e n e w narratives should acknowledge our
diversity but not use your categories
H o w can w e undo or counteract categories based on sur
face appearance such as body type or dress? O n e way to
do so is by attention to language. That form of division,
however, has been contaminated in South Africa by the
use of language differences as a basis for separating Afri
can groups both from English or Afrikaans speakers, and
from each other. All such divisions die hard. As Tomaselli
notes:
"South African apartheid discourse ... continued
to prefigure 'black', 'white', 'coloured' and Indian
communities well after the government insisted that
apartheid was 'dead'. Although no longer entrenched
by state edict, these terms to some extent took on
'lives of their o w n ' and people continued to regard
themselves in terms of the earlier racial/political
namings after apartheid".37
M u s e u m s then need both to cease using the old linguis
tic divisions and to move toward undoing them. Three
moves at the S A M in these directions m a y be noted.
They are all taken from Patricia Davison's narrative, told
in interview, of past actions and future possibilities.
Move 1 : " W e took d o w n all the maps that showed the
homelands. W e took d o w n all the headings that showed
the apartheid categories. W e removed them and they've
not been replaced."
Move 2: This consists of a change in the language(s)
used for the labels of any object or image. W h a t lan
guages should be used, and which are likely to be read
in the way intended? At least two issues need to be
thought through:
• " A lot of the African speakers aren't literate in their
o w n language .. . . O n e of the things I hadn't quite
realised was that putting labels in Xhosa doesn't
necessarily m e a n that you can read them if you're a
Xhosa speaker."
• Teachers w h o bring in schoolchildren for w h o m
English is not the h o m e language often express a
preference for labels in English: a chance for the
children "to practice reading in English". For this
audience at least, labels should at the least include
English.
Move 3: Bound up in the pattern of apartheid was a
division of people on the basis of perceived differences
in language. A different awareness of language use and
language patterns could change those separations. O n e
change in this direction is a shift from referring to peo
ple as "Bantu" to referring to them as "Bantu-speaking".
Museums , Patricia Davison considers, could take further
steps - steps that emphasise c o m m o n features across lan
guages rather than sharp dividing lines.
O n e possibility would be an emphasis on studies
showing that several languages m a y belong to one large
group:
"Blake, w h o was trained in Germany ... was the first
person to develop ... an orthography for writing
d o w n the sounds of Khoi-San language and what w e
call the Bantu languages. That whole sense of a huge
language family that stretches from the Great Lakes
70 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
all the way d o w n to here, nobody k n e w that . . . this
was pioneering, fundamental work."
Another possibility would be to draw attention to c o m
m o n stems cutting across words that have become part
of everyday use and are usually seen as quite separate
from one another:
"Lots of people want to learn African languages now,
so maybe there'd be a good case for looking at the
c o m m o n stem across all the languages, showing h o w
they metamorphose into different kinds of meanings
.. . . What 's interesting is that the same stem can m e a n
about 5 or 6 different things depending on the prefix
and depending on h o w you build up the words. The
classic one is the word for a person. The stem is ntu, so
bantu is just 'people' and ntu is 'a person' and ubuntu
is 'humanity' and abuntu is what everyone considers
to be a good way of being a sociality and so on, but
they all come from ntu. A lot of South Africans don't
k n o w that - they don't think of ubuntu and abantu as
being in any way connected and they're just the same
word with different prefixes."
8. T h e n e w narratives should cover past
injustices but not essentialise us in n e w ways
O n e of the major lessons from South Africa's Truth and
Reconciliation Commission was that history could not
be seen only in terms of equating black and white divi
sions with 'good guy/bad guy' divisions, or with 'oppres
sor/victim' divisions. Oppression and victimisation were
certainly present but history did not fall neatly into any
representation of black Africans as all either powerless
victims or all resistant heroes. It would be a cause for
regret if another set of black and white divisions, with
little attention to similarities across groups or to diver
sity within groups, were to appear as n e w m u s e u m nar
ratives are developed.
For m u s e u m s such as the S A M , the people for
w h o m this type of concern has been expressed are the
Khoi-San. Their history is certainly not one of a happy
integration into a changing South Africa. To return to
Klinghardt's account:
"Large numbers died resisting conquest or from
introduced epidemic diseases and the survivors were
incorporated as permanent minorities into the ...
societies that n o w control their lands".38
There is n o w , however, a more explicit recognition of
their past. In addition, "the extensive changes in South
Africa since 1994 have created n e w opportunities for
redressing past injustices" and "ideas about Khoisan cul
tural heritage have become powerful political symbols
arising from struggles over land claims".39 In addition,
"some contemporary Khoisan people have begun to take
greater pride in their ancestry and have been empowered
to make strategic decisions about conserving their herit-
age.
The danger, Klinghardt continues, is that the n e w
versions of Khoi-San past m a y in themselves not be rec
ognised as another form of Western "idealised images
of the past", images often lacking in "documentary
evidence". Called for, Klinghardt proposes, are further
steps to "bring together members of the public, aca
demics, and Khoisan people so that they can c o m e to a
closer understanding of one another's viewpoints" and
avoid moving to n e w but still simplistic images and
accounts.40
D. A Highlighted Issue:
Bodies In Museums
The previous section has brought together a set of calls
for change. Those calls, and several ways in which they
might be met, have been described in relation to a spe
cific m u s e u m : the South African M u s e u m . They are likely
to apply, however, to all m u s e u m s where the nature and
history of one people is represented by another, espe
cially a 'colonising' or 'higher-status' other.
This final section to the chapter takes up another
aspect of challenge and change that is likely to cut across
a number of m u s e u m s . O n e such aspect will be taken
3 ' Tomaselli.K. (1996) Op.cit.,p. 177. 3 8 Klinghardt, G . (1997) "Khoisan 97". In MuseNews Tune 1997 vol.11, no.6: Cape T o w n : The
South African M u s e u m . 3 9 ibid. 4 0 ibid.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION " " MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 71
up at the end of each of Chapters 3 to 8, with the choice
based on what particular m u s e u m s have highlighted.
In the case of the S A M , the highlighted issue has to do
with bodies: their collection, their display, their treat
ment when out of sight, their possible return.
The general return of skeletons or skeleton parts is
one of the more recent calls for change from members
of the Khoi-San groups. There is a longer and more
charged history, however, surrounding another set of
'bodies'. These are the casts of bodies that are part of the
Bushman or Karoo diorama.
The diorama was mentioned briefly in the section
on earlier collections. It contains the figures cast on the
initiative of Louis Peringuey at a time of concern with
variations in physical appearance as the main mark
ers of cultural groups and with the 'disappearance' of
'pure' types. The figures were later placed in a hunter-
gatherer diorama that was opened in i960 and closed
in 2000 after considerable debate. Its closure attracted
attention both within and outside of South Africa, with
Boston's Christian Science Monitor commenting that
its removal "signals the transformation of this nation's
m u s e u m s in the seven years since the end of apart
heid", the end of a period in which these figures "stood
half naked under glaring lights in a m u s e u m of fos
sils, whale skeletons, and stuffed animal specimens".41
W h a t was the nature of the debate?
T h e nature of opposing voices
W h y get rid of the diorama? Patricia Davison gives one
example of negative reaction that was made very public:
"Abdullah Ibrahim, w h o is a great musician, in a video
talking about his o w n life experiences, talks about
coming into the South African M u s e u m as a child,
and being absolutely terrified of these casts of black
people, which he thought were actual people w h o had
been stuffed, and this was a frightening experience
for him. That. . . gets quoted .. . in different sources."
Highly public also was a comment from Mandela about
the shortcomings of some South African museums:
" O n Heritage Day one year, Mandela referred not nec
essarily to that diorama but whoever wrote his speech
obviously had the diorama in mind. Mandela talked
about some museums w h o treated African people as
'lesser beings' and that still had that old, evolutionary
approach. That was probably about 1997 or therea
bouts."
In contrast, positive voices came from the majority of
visitors and from tour operators. Patricia Davison's o w n
m e m o r y is one example:
" W h e n it first opened it had three windows ... I
remember them as a child, they were quite deep, you
could almost sit in these windows. It was quite a
remarkable experience and nobody w h o has seen that
exhibition forgets it. Most people associate the South
African M u s e u m with that exhibition. If they saw it
as a child, they remember it, they bring their o w n
children back."
The voice of m a n y visitors is indicated also by the tour
operators. Shortly after the closure of the diorama, the
tour operators met with the C E O of Iziko. Their threat
was that they would take the S A M off their routes unless
the rest of the ethnographic section remained as it was
with its offerings of 'real' tribesmen.42 At a time when
the ministry was urging museums to promote the tour
ist industry and to move toward being self-funding, this
was no small threat. Tourists are a major source of fund
ing for museums such as the S A M and most of them are
voyeurs of difference. They travel to see exotica.
Tapping into the opinions of the people represented
Mandela's comments in 1997 initiated a major visitor
survey. In Davison's account of the impact of Mandela's
negative remarks:
"There was really negative publicity but it did provide
an opportunity to, once again, initiate another visi
tor survey ... I've done many, m a n y visitor surveys.
W e did two kinds. W e had one on one interviews
and also had a 'comment box' where people could
write a comment and just post it in, so it wasn't like
a Visitors' Book where you would just see what every-
72 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION f»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
body else had written. That ran for about two years
and overwhelmingly there was support for retaining
the diorama."
The visitors, however, seldom belong to the groups rep
resented in the diorama. The next step then consists of
finding ways to tap into their views. From Davison again:
"Although this was telling us something, w e felt that it
was quite important to ask Khoi-San people what they
thought. W e had a big conference in 1997 where peo
ple came from Botswana and from Namibia - there
were about 2000 people of Khoi-San ancestry at that
time. W e had a big meeting in the Whale Well and
most of the people at that conference also felt that the
diorama was terribly interesting We're in a proc
ess of having discussions with people of Khoi-San
ancestry, but the big problem is to find w h o actually
represents w h o m . There are so m a n y different groups
.... the Khoi-San, basically they're Khoi-Khoi peo
ple, they were the herder peoples, and then the San
people . . . were the hunter/gatherers. If w e wanted
to really consult people whose history is represented
in that diorama, w e would find San people, and most
of the people w h o live in Cape T o w n are Khoi-Khoi.
They call themselves Khoi-San, but it's a whole lot of
identity politics."
A temporary solution
As of 2002, the diorama was "archived", closed while the
m u s e u m decided what to do. O n e possibility is that it
m a y be re-opened but presented in ways that mark its
representing a past way of looking at history and a past
history and a past m u s e u m practice:
"The diorama is in a way an icon. It's part of the his
tory of the m u s e u m and w e would like to retain it as
such, so that it becomes a m u s e u m within a m u s e u m
W h a t one has to do, I think, is document the proc
ess, document the discussion around these issues and
actually include the debate in the display in some
way ... and if w e reopen, change the whole context
in which that diorama is seen. This can be done.
Obviously w e need to be very sure what w e want the
take-away message to be, but that's where w e are at
the moment" . 4 3
The 'take-away message', however, appears to hinge on
the question: W h y does the diorama arouse such strong
feelings, especially negative feelings? For that question,
w e need to ask about the more general meanings of bod
ies within museums . (Note that this issue is taken up in
more detail in the second volume of this series.)
Bodies and The Feelings They Generate
M a n y museums - especially museums with a 'natural
history' emphasis - contain body parts, and m a n y n o w
need to reconsider w h y they hold them and what their
fate should be. The Karoo diorama at the S A M is then
an occasion for asking: Is there something specific about
these bodies that generates strong concerns, or is there
something generally provocative about the holding of
any body parts by any museum?
S o m e particular features to the S A M plaster casts
O n e feature is the way the casts were made. They were, as
I noted earlier, made by building the plaster casts on the
bodies of living people. In Davison's account:
"From the middle of the 1970's (the display) started
to be quite controversial. The issues ranged from
the way of the casting of the actual people . . . they're
very, very life-like casts, so there was an issue around
almost the appropriation of the bodies of people. I've
... written a great deal about this".44
The disturbing feature m a y also be the dehumanisation
of the people represented. To repeat a comment from
the Christian Science Monitor praising the closure of
the diorama, these figures "have stood half-naked under
Christian Science Monitor, June 6,2001.
Interview with Jack Lohman, Cape Town, November 2001 by author.
Patricia Davison. Note however, Abraham's objection to that type of procedure in Chapter 7.
See, for example, Davison, P. (2001) "Typecast: Representations of the Bushmen at the South
African Museum". In Public Archaeology vol.2 no. 1: pp.3-20. W e shall see this concern re-ap
pear in Chapter 7 with a reference to a grandfather's unhappiness about his body cast.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 73
glaring lights in a m u s e u m of fossils .. . and stuffed ani
mal figures".45
The people represented are then doubly demeaned:
demeaned by the implication that they are on a par with
the other 'specimens' and, as humans , by their public
half-nakedness. Demeaned also is the audience, n o w
cast in the role of voyeurs.
Carmel Schrire adds further possibilities. Her c o m
ments were prompted by the debate surrounding a later
exhibit based on copies of the original plaster casts.
(This is the exhibition Miscast displayed at the S A
National Gallery in Cape T o w n in 1996 and described
in more detail in Chapter 7). Schrire argues for a return
to the question: W h a t gave rise to the earlier mania for
measuring and recording physical features? She sees
it not simply as an expression of physical anthropolo
gy's insistence on differences a m o n g people in terms of
their physical features. Involved as well is an exercise of
power, part of the dehumanising objectification of the
Other and not dissimilar to the collections of heads as
trophies in m a n y parts of the world, simply overlaid
in m u s e u m s by reference to the interests of 'science'.
Where the figures are those of w o m e n - and especially
when the concern is with female genitalia as it so mark
edly was in the case of Sarah Baartman - there is added
to this exercise of power, Schrire continues, a covert
pornography.46
The objections then m a y reflect one or all of these
implications: the implication that our culture is merely
the s u m of our bodies, that w e are a subjugated people,
or that - under the guise of 'science' - w e can be dis
played as sexual objects.
S o m e general aspects to the presence of bodies in
m u s e u m s
The S A M is certainly not the only m u s e u m in the world
where bodies are held and where the collection, display,
treatment, and possible return of bodies can become
part of the calls for change. More generally:
• The issue is not restricted to the two countries that are
the focus of this volume. In fact, the most extensive
discussion to date of bodies in m u s e u m s comes from
the United States, where American Indian groups
have been especially forceful in their arguments for
the return of bodies from m u s e u m s in the United
States, and the Native American Protection Act
( N A G P R A ) has become a much-cited model of what
should happen.47
To be noted also is a newspaper comment on a forth
coming report on the presence of h u m a n remains in
British museums: a survey "group .. . is understood to
have found that at least two-thirds of British museums
hold remains".48
• The issue is not restricted to natural history museums.
Use of the S A M casts, for example, became a cause
célèbre for Cape Town's National Art Gallery.
• At stake are both the reasons for the original collection
and for retention or return. The original collection
m a y have been as trophies of war, as an exercise
of power, as a way of terrorising a group seen as in
need of subjugation, as covert pornography, or as
an expression of a science in need of 'data' based on
physical measurements.
The same reasons, however, m a y not apply - or not
apply to the same degree - to the retention of what one
has. S o m e of the objections raised by native people to
retention relate then to the reasons for retention in
relation to the quantity of remains in possession. "Native
peoples ask what knowledge has been produced through
the study of these remains that is of value to them.
They also want to k n o w w h y museums need so m a n y
skeletal remains to study".49 The Smithsonian Institution
has, for example, 28 500 skeletal remains of which "native
American remains numbered approximately 17 600 indi
viduals." The S A M has over 20 000 remains.
Specifically relevant to retention also appear to
be m u s e u m concerns about what will happen to the
bodies once returned (Will what was once 'ours' n o w
be 'simply destroyed'?) and about a further set of
rights. These are the rights of the dead. They are a criti
cal part of making sure that the identity of bodies is
clearly established, either as individuals, or at least to
the extent of being sure that the remains go back to the
group from which they came, and only to that group.
M u s e u m s , one expects, m a y well be concerned also
74 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
with public accounts of the degree of respect and care
with which they have treated the dead they hold.
Added as well, in some recent arguments, are the
rights of'the general public'. This argument appears, for
example, in a joint declaration issued by several Euro
pean m u s e u m s in December 2002, arguing in general
against the repatriation of objects from their collec
tions. The "signatories included the Louvre in Paris, the
Hermitage in St. Petersburg, the Prado in Madrid, the
Metropolitan, Guggenheim, Whitney and M u s e u m
of Modern Art in N e w York, the Rijksmuseum in
Amsterdam, and the State M u s e u m s in Berlin".50
"The declaration described repatriation as 'a dis
service to all visitors .. . w e should acknowledge that
m u s e u m s serve not just the citizens of one nation but
the people of every nation ... w e should recognise
that objects acquired in earlier times must be viewed
in the light of different sensitivities and values, reflec
tive of that era'."
This report of the declaration notes that the British
M u s e u m was not a signatory but quotes a spokesperson
as saying that its Director "supported its intent ... ' w e
don't believe in breaking up collections' ... the British
M u s e u m was a place where 'you can come and see the
entire history of mankind in one place'."51
• The issue of bodies and their retention may become
part of the argument for retention of other items. In the
eyes of some, for example, the slow m o v e on the part
of the British M u s e u m toward the repatriation
of h u m a n remains to Australia reflects in part its
reluctance to provide any ammunition to the Greek
government in its campaign for the return of the Elgin
marbles.52 In effect, the issue of these being bodies
m a y not be particularised but be subserved under
the general view that 'what I have, I hold', avoiding
exceptions that m a y 'open the floodgates'.
• The particular meanings of bodies and their return
cant be assumed to be identical for all groups. For
all the widespread nature of concerns about bodies,
and the widespread emotional charges that they
carry, it would be unwise to assume complete
universality of meaning.
There is as yet no specific data emerging from South
Africa's m u s e u m s on this point. The extensive discus
sions about North American Indians, however, provide
a cautionary example. The example comes from Steve
Russell. For m a n y American Indians, Russell comments,
the return of the dead is especially significant because
the spiritual welfare of the living group depends on the
proper burial of the dead. O n that basis then, one might
expect that all tribes would welcome the swift return of
bodies. That does not apply, however, to the Zuni. Their
preference, Bray notes, is to m o v e with less speed. N o w
that return is a possibility, they need first to develop the
purification ceremonies needed to overcome the con
tamination that has inevitably occurred during the bod
ies' stay in museums. 5 3
In effect, m u s e u m s would do well to consider not
only the meanings that bodies are likely to have for
most or all groups but also the particular meanings that
the methods of collection, display, archival treatment,
and return have for the specific groups from which the
bodies have c o m e or w h o have some other stake in body-
related events and practices.
Moving Forward
The S A M has provided a first step toward using an
analysis of a particular m u s e u m as a step toward two aims.
O n e of these is to build an understanding of challenge
and change, noting the forms these take and the circum
stances that shape various forms. The other is to build
a 'bank' of examples of change: a 'bank' that other m u s -
The Christian Science Monitor, 2001. Op.cit.
Schrire, C . ( 1996) "Three Views on the Exhibition curated by Pippa Skotnes with Jos Thorne
in the South African National Gallery". In Southern African Review of Books. Issue 43, July/
August 1996.
The Act itself is available on www.usbr.gov/nagpra/neglaw.htm. Useful also are ( 1) coments-
by Steve Russell in 1997 (www.archaeology.miningco.com/library/weekly/aa083197.htm)
and (2) a report rssued by the Arctic Stuies Center (www.mnh.si.edu/arctic/html.
repattb.html), prepared in 1995 by Tamara Bray at the Smithsonian's National M u s e u m
of Natural History.
4 8 Sydney Morning Herald, December 11,2001, p . 3 4 9 Bray, T (1995) Op.cit.
5 0 ibid.
5 1 ibid.
Sydney Morning Herald, December 18,2002.
5 3 Russell, S. (1997) Op.cit. and Bray (1995) Op.cit.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*» MUSEUMS IN CARE T O W N AND SYDNEY 75
eums can draw on as possibilities to borrow, adapt, or
avoid. Without a base in specific museums, any general
picture lacks a base. It quickly becomes bare and abstract.
Without the specifics also, other museums are likely to
feel little sense of recognition or relevance.
The next chapter takes a further step toward broad
ening the base. The m u s e u m considered - Sydney's Aus
tralian M u s e u m - is both like and unlike the S A M . It
is, for example, a m u s e u m that combines 'natural his
tory' with 'cultural history', at least in the sense that the
material about Indigenous groups is part of a m u s e u m
with a strong emphasis on fossils, rocks, whale bones
and various animals and insects. W e shall also see the
re-appearance of several of the calls for change that
have emerged in relation to the S A M . At the same time,
there are differences in the history and the setting that
promote variations in the emphasis placed on vari
ous calls for change, in the responses made , and in the
issues highlighted. In effect, the m u s e u m chosen as a
focus for Chapter 4 offers a productive mix of similari
ties and differences to Chapter 3's focus on the South
African M u s e u m .
I turn then to Sydney's first m u s e u m , k n o w n as the
Australian M u s e u m .
76 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
CHAPTER 4
Sydney's Australian M u s e u m
A n d Its Indigenous Australians Gallery
WI T H T H I S M U S E U M , w e take further steps
toward the overall aim of specifying forms of
challenge and transformation and the circumstances that
shape them. That specification, to repeat some earlier
statements, serves two purposes. It helps build an under
standing of challenge and transformation that makes
sense of events and can be used as a base for decisions. It
also provides a 'case book' of challenges that other muse
u m s might anticipate and of changes that they might
consider, borrow, adapt, or avoid. M u s e u m s undoubtedly
differ from one another. Between them, however, are also
similarities that allow a sense of recognition - a sense, for
example, that w e are not the only people this has hap
pened to - and the possibility of learning from events in
other places.
W h a t might be gained from turning to the Austral
ian M u s e u m ? Ideally, w e should find that this m u s e u m
both affirms and extends what was learned from con
sidering Cape Town's South African M u s e u m . S o m e
re-affirmation should occur, given similarities between
the two m u s e u m s . In both, for example, the history is
one of an original appeal to colonial pride, an emphasis
on what was perceived as 'natural history', an early con
cern with a 'disappearing' people, and a strong influ
ence from directors with interests that went beyond
the usual bounds of natural history m u s e u m s . In both,
the current call is for a n e w vision of history and of rela
tionships between the country's 'first peoples' and those
w h o came later: visions marked by terms such as nation-
building, redress, healing, or reconciliation.
At the same time, there should not be any sim
ple repetition as w e turn from the one m u s e u m to the
other. Between the two places, there are differences
that should prompt some changes in pattern and some
extension of what w e have already learned. In the Aus
tralian M u s e u m , for example, there did not emerge the
same degree of separation between 'cultural' and 'natu
ral' history that appeared in South Africa, or the same
strength of focus on physical differences among groups.
In addition, w e should be able in Sydney to see changes
in place that international isolation and - more recently -
the wait for a government-based reorganisation delayed
in Cape Town's m u s e u m s .
As a summary device at this point, I shall use three
aspects of m u s e u m s that have emerged as aspects to
watch. These have to do with people, with practices,
and with meanings. For each, I shall note briefly what
Chapter 3 contributed and, in advance, some of what
Chapter 4 will add.
To start with people, attention to this aspect of muse
u m s involves asking about the cast of involved people,
their agendas, and their resources for having their agen
das followed. Chapter 3 brought out several players or
stakeholders. S o m e of these were on the staff of m u s
eums. Particular directors and their interests provided
one example. Others were the several 'audiences': the
'old' visitors with their established expectations, the
'new ' w h o needed to be attracted. More on the 'outside'
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY JJ
were the representatives of various government depart
ments: setting n e w aims, introducing n e w adminis
trative structures, controlling funding, and actively
monitoring to see if m u s e u m s were meeting the govern
ment's objectives. Introduced last were the Indigenous
groups acknowledged in the m u s e u m s as 'first peoples'
and making increasingly explicit objections to m u s e u m
practices: practices related to display (e.g., the display
of'bodies'), assumptions of ownership, and patterns of
decision-making.
W h a t will Chapter 4 add on this score? The history
of the Australian M u s e u m brings out again the impact
of particular directors and their interests. Added now,
however, is the impact of Indigenous members of
m u s e u m staff, especially in relation to moves toward
'consultation' and 'new relationships' with Aboriginal
communities. Audiences again matter. The 'old' need
to be persuaded to take a different view of Indigenous
people and of Australian history. That history should
n o w be more inclusive in the people it covers and less
congratulatory toward the actions of the colonisers.
The 'new' audiences need to include Aboriginal audi
ences, often outside city centres and not easily reached.
Government departments still matter: the Austral
ian M u s e u m is predominantly state-funded. They are
in this case, however, less intrusive than in the Cape
T o w n case. In contrast, the voice of Indigenous groups
is stronger. As in South Africa, they can benefit from
government-initiated hearings that have m a d e injus
tices less matters of 'silence' and more matters of public
knowledge. In addition, these groups emerge as having
at hand some particular resources. Indigenous groups
n o w have available - from events occurring in film and
television - the resource of demonstrated success in
Aboriginal production and in claims to control access
to people, places, narratives and decision-making.
Practices aie the second aspect of m u s e u m s that w e
can track across m u s e u m s and can use as a base for con
sidering specific forms of challenge and change. S o m e
practices are highly visible. They have to do, for exam
ple, with what is displayed and h o w it is displayed. The
display of 'bodies' is the example highlighted by Chap
ter 3. Other practices are less visible. They have to do,
for example, with the division of staff into various dis
ciplines or the assignment of various responsibilities to
particular sections. Emerging from the South African
M u s e u m was the need to specify what particular prac
tices were likely to be singled out as targets for change
by various groups of people. Chapter 3, for example,
looked especially at targets within objections from
Indigenous peoples. To recap, m u s e u m s were called on
to undo, in their displays and in their o w n thinking,
images of Indigenous people as (1) irrelevant to modern
life (disappearing, past, part only of remote rural life,
simple rather than complex in thought and action), (2)
objects rather than subjects (they are there to be stud
ied, w e can tell their stories and decide the fate of what
they once owned), and (3) homogeneous rather than
diverse (now either 'just like us', or all re-essentialised
as passive victims or faultless resistance heroes).
W h a t does the Australian M u s e u m add on the score
of practices? W e can n o w trace a similar set of calls for
change, enhancing the likelihood that this form of spec
ification will be relevant to other museums , especially
those with an historical orientation and an Indigenous/
non-Indigenous divide. More clearly to the fore than
in Chapter 3, however, is a picture of changes related to
those several objections. Sydney, as I noted earlier, had
a head start over Cape T o w n . It had not been as isolated
internationally. It had also not needed to wait a number
of years while mergers and funding shifts were debated
by government committees. W e can then consider some
changes in place and some further revisions of these
already in sight. Brought out also by this m u s e u m are
a particular conceptual framework for practices - a
framework of 'communities of practice' - and some
particular gaps in our understanding of change. Needed
now, for example, is a clearer understanding of the spe
cifics of change. W h a t makes some practices easier to
change than others? H o w does 'consultation' or 'nego
tiation' proceed? H o w are 'new relationships' or ' c o m
munities of practice' established?
The third and last aspect of m u s e u m s to be noted in
this s u m m a r y m a p has to do with meanings: with the
assumptions, the concepts, the ways of thinking that
underlie practices and give rise to practices being per
ceived as natural, logical, reasonable, or offensive. The
South African M u s e u m in Chapter 3 highlighted the
significance of socially constructed categories: catego
ries, for example, that divide 'the natural' from 'the cul-
78 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
tural', that divide people into 'black' and 'white', 'civi
lised' or 'primitive', 'significant' or 'unimportant', fit
'to rule' or to be 'hewers of w o o d and drawers of water'.
W h a t will Chapter 4 add on this score? Categories
will again emerge as important, together with attempts
to cut across various divides. S o m e of Cape Town's
distinctions (e.g., between art and not-art) n o w take
a different form. Indigenous work was more readily
recognised as art, as distinct from craft, than was the
case in South Africa. It was also seen as readily avail
able for appropriation: not only worth taking over but
also open to take-overs by all. A n e w division, however,
n o w becomes prominent. This has to do with what is
labelled as 'private' (for restricted viewing only) or as
'public' (available for viewing by all). Within traditional
Aboriginal culture, restricted audiences m a y apply to
designs, narratives, dances, knowledge of the law or
of the country. In some cases, the audience excluded
consists of members of the opposite gender: w o m e n or
m e n . In others, the restrictions apply to young people
w h o have not been initiated into adulthood. The usual
m u s e u m practice of open viewing (like the assump
tion of Aboriginal art designs as open to all for copy
ing) runs counter to that tradition, calls for a review
of m u s e u m practices, and contributes some particular
tensions to shared decision-making.
With this m u c h of an advance m a p , let us turn to the
m u s e u m itself. The structure of the chapter is similar
to that of Chapter 3. The opening section offers a brief
visitor's eye view of the m u s e u m , reflecting again the
study of m u s e u m s in terms of their physical features
and the impressions that these make . The second sec
tion then looks at beginnings and at the growth of col
lections, with primary attention to collections related to
Indigenous Australians. The intent again is to bring out
the circumstances that led to various views of what the
m u s e u m should do and to some particular methods of
collection and display becoming established. The third
and fourth sections focus on events after a particular
call for change: the 1993 paper issued by the M u s e u m s
Association entitled Previous Possession, New Obliga
tions. These sections take as their bases the redesign
of the gallery covering Indigenous Australians and the
establishment of an Aboriginal Heritage Unit, a Unit
charged with responsibility for policies and actions
related to consultation, h u m a n remains, and secret/
sacred objects.
The final section again takes a closer look at a high
lighted issue. In Chapter 3, the special issue was the
treatment of bodies, highlighted by claims for the
return of h u m a n remains and the withdrawal of the
M u s e u m ' s B u s h m a n diorama. In the present chapter,
the special issue is the extent to which calls for change,
and changes m a d e or considered, are occurring - within
the same country - in other media: in the Australian
case, in film and television. It is often said of m u s e u m s
that they do not exist in isolation, that they should be
studied 'in context'. Such general phrases, however, call
for some specific meanings. Considering contexts in
terms of events in other media is a step in that direc
tion. Noted especially are the ways in which events in
film and television altered the awareness of change and
the examples available, to challengers and to the makers
of change, of what was possible.
As was the case for Cape Town's South African
M u s e u m , I draw on a mixed set of materials: unguided
time at the M u s e u m , interviews, and text in print or on
website.1
A. A Visitor's Eye View
The entry to the Australian M u s e u m is through the
doors of the older part of the building: a part with a
darkened sandstone Victorian façade, functional rather
than decorative in style.2 Like the South African M u s e u m ,
the M u s e u m is set in a central and easily accessible part
of the city, close to a much-used park. The ground floor
contains the M u s e u m shop, two cafés, a temporary exhi
bition area, a skeleton exhibition - "Skeletons: a bony
perspective on natural history"3 - and a gallery entitled,
"Indigenous Australians". In the Museum's description:
"From the Dreaming to the struggle for self-determi
nation and Land Rights, Indigenous Australians tells
the stories of Australia's first peoples in their o w n
words".4
Like the South African M u s e u m , the Australian M u s e u m
is made up predominantly of exhibitions relating to flora
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 79
and fauna. The floors above the ground floor, for exam
ple, are given over to permanent or semi-permanent
exhibition spaces covering bio-diversity, entomology
and biological evolution. The titles convey the emphasis:
the " C h a p m a n Mineral Collection", "Birds A n d Insects",
"More Than Dinosaurs" and "Biodiversity: Life Support
ing Life". Within the permanent exhibitions is also one
dealing specifically with h u m a n change. Titled " H u m a n
Evolution: Tracks Through Time", it "follows the evolu
tion of our species" up to early m a n .
Temporary gallery space is given to changing exhi
bitions on both natural and social history. Recent exhi
bitions m a k e a point of combining the two or of break
ing the usual barriers between what is often regarded
as 'natural' rather than 'cultural', or 'primitive' rather
than 'modern', in ways that have audience appeal. A n
example of crossing the natural/cultural divide is a 2001
Bat exhibition in which factual information was inte
grated with popular culture iconography and mythol
ogy (roughly, bat biology plus vampire legends). A n
example of crossing the primitive/modern divide is
a 2002 exhibition entitled Body Art. This explored the
body art of individuals and communities all over the
world, ranging from body-painting to tattooing and
body-piercing and covering both old and current prac
tices. This popular exhibition brought together pho
tographs, audio-visual displays and artefacts and was
"recommended for mature audiences 15 years and over".5
A 2003 exhibition on death ranged over cultures and
historical periods and was designed to attract another
n e w audience. This is the group of over-65's, a group
that the M u s e u m ' s audience research group has found
to often go to art galleries but not to m u s e u m s such as
the Australian M u s e u m , regarding them as "worthy but
dull and child-oriented".6
The Indigenous Australians Gallery
The current display was designed in 1995 and is intended
to stay in its main form for up to 10 years. At the start
is a set of large photographs of Aboriginal Australians
w h o currently hold major positions and are figures w h o
often appear in press reports. Unlike the small photo
graphs of contemporary San people in the S A M , these
are both large and 'portrait' in style: the kind of rep
resentation one would expect to see on the walls of an
'establishment' building.
The portraits are of three w o m e n (they include a
traditional elder, Alice Kelly, and w o m e n of position
in education and consultancy) and three m e n (these
include Justice Bob Bellear and two others prominent in
government and education). The immediate message for
this visitor is that Aboriginals are people of the present.
They do not belong only to the past. They are also a to-
be-respected part of modern society: definitely not to
be thought of as low in capacity, status, or achievement.
The Gallery proper is in sections that appear to start
with 'easier' issues, essentially correcting images of
Aboriginals as lacking in spirituality or in complexity
of thought. The sections that follow then move toward
issues that challenge some stereotypes of Australian his
tory: images of Australian actions towards Aboriginals
as taking only the forms of pure benevolence or benign
neglect, or of Aboriginals as failing to struggle against
dispossession. These sections take up issues such as
the role of missions, Land Rights, Deaths in Custody,
and the Stolen Generation. The closing section makes
a return to the positive, emphasising the goal and the
hope of reconciliation.
More specifically, the first section is given over to
the theme of Spirituality. It includes oral stories, some
traditional Aboriginal paintings, and an introduction
to the serpent (creationist) imagery that often appears
in Aboriginal narratives and art. The imagery and
the stories vary from group to group but - to reduce a
complex belief system to a simplistic form - one c o m
m o n theme is that the shape of the land (its water holes,
rocks, hills, and rivers) shows the imprint of ancestral
figures as they emerged from beneath the surface of the
land, moved over the land, and returned to sleep again
beneath the surface. Places, however, are not only a
record of the past. They are also sites of ancestral power
that can be tapped by the people w h o belong to that
area and behave appropriately. The place to which one
belongs then becomes a powerful marker of identity,
no matter where one lives, and a source of control over
social behaviour and over treatment of the land.7
This section of the gallery includes rock art, predom
inantly in the form of hands, on the walls of a cave-like
structure in which visitors can sit and listen to Aborigi-
80 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «< MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
nal voices telling stories from the Dreamtime (creation
ist stories).8 The accompanying text points out the inti
mate connection between religious beliefs and attach
ment to the land:
"Indigenous Australian religious beliefs are derived
from a sense of belonging - to the land, to the sea . . .
Aboriginal spirituality derives mainly from the sto
ries of the Dreaming ... The Dreaming sets out the
structures of society, the rules of social behaviour
and the ceremonies performed in order to maintain
the life in the land."
The next section deals with the missions, with imported
belief. The accompanying text notes that some groups,
primarily in the Torres Strait Islands, managed to c o m
bine Christianity with traditional expression and belief.
That was not, however, the usual result:
"The relationship has been a difficult one. In some
cases missions became instruments of government
policy, engaging in practices such as forcibly separat
ing indigenous children from their families in order
to maximise control over the children's education
into Christian ways and beliefs. In this way the mis
sions contributed to the suppression of Indigenous
cultural practice and language."
The exhibition continues through issues of family, land
and social justice. S o m e of these issues - Deaths in Cus
tody is a prime example - are highly confrontational, in
the sense that they challenge any complacent assumption
of equal access to justice. 'White' justice, even in contem
porary times, emerges as suspect when the people are
'black'. Other topics - the occurrence of demonstrations
and the growth of political movements, for example
- highlight the existence of struggle on the part of A b o
riginals rather than any passive acceptance of being vic
tims or any ready adoption of moves toward assimilation.
These topics are, however, less obviously questioning of
the motives, ethics, and assumptions of non-Aboriginals.
The final area of the exhibition steps back from the
direct presentation of injustices and protests. It focuses
instead on positive steps taken by government and
Aboriginal groups towards future reconciliation. This
section is m a d e up predominantly of posters and state
ments from the Aboriginal Reconciliation Council and
from Reconciliation Australia.
B. The Growth Of The Collections
As in Chapter 3, a summary of the museum's history
serves two purposes. It provides an indication of whether
some tensions have been present from the start or are
new. It also points to long-standing practices and orien
tations that m a y need to be overcome before changes can
be m a d e or, more positively, that offer fertile ground for
change.
The Australian M u s e u m , the first m u s e u m in Aus
tralia, was formed primarily as a necessary part of a
self-respecting settlement. The aim was an early form of
'nation-building', directed toward status in the eyes of
others rather than at internal cohesion:
" O n 4 July 1821 ... some gentlemen of Sydney gath
ered to form the colony's first scientific society, the
Philosophical Society of Australasia. A m o n g its
numerous aims was the establishment of a m u s e u m ,
with each of seven original members paying £5 to set
up the collection and purchase books of reference".9
This chapter owes a great deal to the assistance given by Peter White at the Aboriginal Heritage
Unit and Philip Gordon, who directs the Aboriginal Heritage Unit and is also Acting Head
of the Department of Anthropology. Gordon and White made available several in press
and unpublished papers as well as material on CD-rom. These and the substantial on-line
material available from the Museum covered most of the untaped interview comments, and
I cite papers in preference to the interview notes.
A virtual tour of the Indigenous Australia Gallery can be found at www.amononline.net.au/
virtualtour/index.htm.
' Australian Museum Guide.
4 ibid.
Muse, Feb.-April 2002, Sydney: Australian Museum, p.3.
Sydney Morning Herald, November 23, 2002, citing a report from the Australian Museum:
"Energised, Engaged, Everywhere: Older Australians and Museums".
For a short introduction to some of this mythology in terms of its association with Aboriginal
"desert art", one source is Peterson, N . (1981) "Art of the Desert". In Aboriginal Australia
(pp.43-45). Sydney: Australian Gallery Directors Council. A more detailed source, cover
ing a variety of areas, is Crumlm, R. (1991) Aboriginal Art and Spirituality. Melbourne:
Collins Dove.
For those not familiar with traditional Aboriginal imagery, the Australian Museum sponsored
website - www.dreamtime.net.au/indigenou/spirituality.cfm - offers a good introduction.
Branagan, D.F. (19791 "The Idea of a Museum". In Strahan, R. (Ed.) Rare and Curious Speci
mens: An Illustrated History of the Australian Museum. Sydney: The Australian Museum,
p.3.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 8l
"The pursuit of pure, and even applied, science was
a matter for educated gentlemen of sufficient means
to provide for their o w n expenses and to pay assist
ants. Since the population of the colony did not reach
12,000 until the end of the 1820s (and some 5,000 of
these were largely unlettered convicts), there were
not m a n y in this category - too few, indeed, to main
tain the activities of the premature Philosophical
Society".10
Support for the m u s e u m , however, increased with the
arrival of Alexander Macleay and a large collection
of insects that could provide an initial m u s e u m base.
Macleay urged his patron, Governor Darling, toward
the establishment of a Colonial M u s e u m . A m u s e u m , it
was argued, would help raise the colony's image abroad.
In the words of a letter published in a local magazine in
1828 (by an anonymous author):
"The foundation of a M u s e u m for the reception and
public exhibition of the natural productions and
curiosities of Australia, could not but raise her in
the estimation of the world at large, while it would
excite her to further efforts to maintain and increase
that good opinion and respect which such a measure
would procure".11
The Sydney Gazette of June 1828 followed up this concern:
"In such a quarter of the globe as ours, it is a disgrace that
w e have not long since had a M u s e u m formed".12
M a n y of the colonial collections or collecting activi
ties, however, existed as a way of providing exotic nat
ural history or ethnographic materials to European
m u s e u m s . Even the official history of the Australian
M u s e u m admits that collecting was not always an altru
istic or beneficial activity for the colony:
"There was a d e m a n d for Australian curiosities in
Europe and m o n e y could be m a d e from trading in
suitable specimens A consequence of European
patronage during these years, and indeed until
m u c h later, was that m a n y precious type specimens
of unique Australian creatures, minerals and plants
were deposited in European m u s e u m s or private col
lections. Although m a n y were well looked after, oth
ers vanished and cannot be located today in the insti
tutions that received them".13
The Place of Natural and Social History
O n e of the issues highlighted by the South African
M u s e u m was the nature of any divide between what
is regarded as 'natural history' and what is regarded as
'cultural history'. Another was the significance attached
to 'people' and their changing activities in m u s e u m s
emphasising 'animals' and a long-term, largely evolution
ary view of history. The Australian M u s e u m again high
lights these issues. It highlights as well the significance of
particular m u s e u m staff and of their perceptions of the
differences a m o n g people that matter and the nature of
historical change.
As with the S A M , the current division of space
implies that the larger share of the Australian M u s
eum's concerns is with natural history. That dominance
is reflected also in the background descriptions of most
of the curators. They have been, over time, naturalists,
entomologists, palaeontologists, marine biologists.
In the early years, the collections related to Aborigi
nals were sparse. In an 1832 description of the m u s e u m ,
George Bennett - a visiting naturalist w h o became
curator in 1835 - regretted the lack of such material and
urged that materials be gathered before Aboriginals dis
appeared:
"Native weapons, utensils, and other specimens of the
arts, as existing a m o n g the Aborigines, as well as the
skulls of the different tribes and accurate drawings of
their peculiar cast of features, would be a desirable
addition. At the present time, such might be procured
without m u c h difficulty; but it is equally certain, as
well as . . . to be regretted, that the tribes in the settled
parts of the colony are fast decreasing, and many, if
not all, will, at no distant period, be k n o w n but by
n a m e . Here, in a public m u s e u m , the remains of the
arts & c. as existing a m o n g them, m a y be preserved
as lasting memorials of the former races inhabiting
the lands, w h e n they had ceased to exist".14
By 1879, however, the collections were extensive. The
record says "2000 specimens" by the time of the major
82 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
exhibition at Sydney's Garden Palace in 1879: in m a n y
ways a copy of London's 1851 Exhibition, and built at the
behest of Queen Victoria. The items included:
"the habits, dresses, ornaments, weapons, canoes and
paddles, implements for fishing and the chase and
the rude pottery of the various Australian Colonies
and the natives of the several groups of Polynesia".15
The Australian M u s e u m lent out most of its collection
to this grand exhibition, only to have it all destroyed in a
fire in September 1882 (the exhibition had closed in April
1880 but the collections remained in place until 1882).
The m u s e u m expressed its official regret:
"(I)t will be almost impossible to get such a large col
lection together again and w e are led to this conclu
sion by the rapid disappearance of the Australian
Aborigines from the face of the earth, while other
savage people represented in the Court are suffer
ing from a like decadence in ever increasing ration . . .
The Aborigine seems incapable of the improvement
of other native races . . . he appears to have few aspi
rations beyond satisfying the necessities of nature
and indulgence, w h e n near European settlements, in
acquired but questionable tastes They are repre
sented in N e w South Wales and Victoria by strug
gling remnants of once powerful tribes w h o are too
often so debased and degraded as scarcely to deserve
recognition as remains even of a savage race".16
In fact, the regret m a y not have been major. The collec
tions, if returned, had been considered as needing to be
removed from the m u s e u m , to make room for other col
lections:
" (T) here is no room in the M u s e u m for the ethnological
collection which, if returned to this M u s e u m after
the close of the Exhibition, must be packed in boxes
and stored in the cellars, thereby incurring great risk
of being destroyed".17
Fortunately, the curator at the time (Edward R a m
say, 1874-1894) rebuilt the collection so that five years
later "some 7500 specimens were housed in a newly con
structed ethnological hall".18
Prompting a Change in Orientation
Just as Louis Peringuey was an influential figure in the
ethnological interests of the S A M , Robert Etheridge
was influential at the Australian M u s e u m . H e was Cura
tor, and then Director, of the Australian M u s e u m from
1895 until 1919. Initially, the m u s e u m had established two
posts - Curator and Secretary, with the Secretary at times
playing the senior role. Etheridge's difficulties with the
then Secretary - Sinclair - did not end until 1918 w h e n the
two positions were merged into the single one of Curator
and Director.19
In his history of the Australian M u s e u m , Strahan
notes the strength of Etheridge's interests in the area
termed, as it was in the South African M u s e u m , ethnol
ogy, with the term n o w covering both material objects
and social customs:
"Although Etheridge came to his position in the
M u s e u m with a distinguished reputation in palae
ontology and continued to add to this throughout
his life, his appointment to the staff of the M u s e u m
led h im into productive studies in ethnology. The
sequence of his published papers indicates that his
interest arose from observations of cave paintings and
carvings in the course of his expeditions, and from
his palaeontological investigations of Aboriginal mid
dens, but it was not long before his interest expanded
to include Aboriginal artefacts and customs. Over the
period from 1890 to 1920, approximately one-third
of his publications were in this field and he let it be
ibid., p.6.
ibid., p.8. The letter referred to was written by an anonymous author.
12lbid.,p.8.
ibid., p.3.
1 4 Strahan, R . (1979) " A n Excellent Nucleus 1827 - 1835". In Strahan, R . (Ed.) (1979) Op.cit.
p.ll.
15ibid.,p.38.
Official Record of the Sydney International Exhibition, 1879, Sydney, 1881, p.xviii. Cited by
Strahan R . (Ed. ) ( 1979). Op.cit, p.39.
' ' Strahan, R . (Ed.) (1979) Op.cit, p.39.
18ibid.,p.38.
1 9 ibid., p.80.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "•> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 83
k n o w n that he regarded the ethnological galleries as
the most appropriate m o n u m e n t to his endeavours in
the M u s e u m " . 2 0
That interest was maintained in spite of a drastic cut in
budget with the depression in 1893 (in that year a drop
in the budget from £11,000 to £4,000) and a drop in
staff from thirty four to twenty three.21 Strahan notes
Etheridge's protests especially on staffing and his being
granted an assistant in 1901 for the ethnological work.22
That m e m b e r of staff was William Thorpe, trained by
Etheridge, and m a d e Head of the n e w Department of
Ethnology in 1906. Thorpe continued in that role until
his death in 1932.
Etheridge stood out also for three other moves for
ward. O n e was his 1905 acquisition of the collection of
Aboriginal artefacts gathered in Queensland by W . E .
Roth during Roth's term as the State's Aboriginal Pro
tector. A second was his strong recommendation for
restrictions to the export of Aboriginal artefacts.23 A
third was his emphasis on the need both to gather mate
rials "in the course of manufacture" and to use archae
ological excavation, with excavation highlighting the
presence of both change and continuity in Aboriginal
ways of life.
To quote from Specht's history of anthropology at
the M u s e u m :
"Etheridge was one of the first to examine aboriginal
pre-history through archaeological excavation, and
set in train an interest in the subject that has been
continued by all subsequent members of the
Department of Anthropology".24
Part of that continuity was Thorpe's "revival of archae
ological excavation" after a lapse of work between 1900
and 1930. That revival, Specht notes, "was a brave move
in the light of statements made by the .. . president of the
Anthropology Section of A N Z A A S in 1928 that 'excavat
ion would be in vain', since Aborigines were 'an unchang
ing people living in an unchanging environment' ",25
Thorpe's successor (McCarthy, Curator of Anthro
pology 1920-1964) maintained the museum's position of
a changing past and a changing people - the essential
assumption behind archaeological excavation - and the
museum's interest in both objects and social patterns.
The latter position was supported also by the orienta
tion of the Anthropology Department at the University
of Sydney: a Department supporting a structural-func
tionalist approach to societies and their differences.
Do these academic orientations matter? They can
often be sources for further forms of contest or alliance.
Chapter 3, for example, brought out Davison's c o m
ments on the way the South African M u s e u m ' s early
orientation toward an object-focused, material culture
perspective was in line with the orientation of the Afri
kaans-speaking universities and of m a n y G e r m a n uni
versities, even though there were no formal affiliations
with these universities. In contrast, anthropologists at
the Australian M u s e u m could draw support from the
appointment of Radcliffe Brown to the first Professor
ship of Anthropology at the University of Sydney in 1926
(he held the chair between 1926 to 1930). "(T)he struc
tural-functionalist school", Specht comments, "had lit
tle time for material culture".26
A n Early Focus: Aboriginal Art
In any society it is helpful to ask h o w 'self and 'others'
are kept apart or interwoven. In some, groups m a y be
separated by a complete divide. Everything on the 'other'
side is regarded as 'primitive', 'ugly', or 'without value'. In
others, the wall m a y be uneven, with some physical fea
tures of 'the other' regarded as attractive, some aspects of
their way of life as interesting, some parts of what they
produce as of value.
M u s e u m s reflect these variations in the nature of
the divide. Within Australia, the early soft part in the
divide had to do with Aboriginal art. It was seen from
a relatively early time as of value in two senses: seen as
worth collecting by some and as worth appropriating
by others. The history of its appreciation will re-appear
in Chapter 8: a chapter that takes the Art Gallery of
N e w South Wales as its focus. For n o w , however, I shall
use McCarthy's position to illustrate a mixture of two
views. O n the one hand, he was a strong advocate of the
M u s e u m ' s collecting Aboriginal artwork (bark paint
ings especially), with a clear recognition that this work
had marked aesthetic value. In no sense was it 'craft' or
'primitive' work to be ignored. At the same time, M c C a -
84 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION '•»- MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
rthy supported the appropriation of Aboriginal designs
by non-Aboriginals, seeing the merger as a step toward
a n e w national identity. A n exhibition in 1941 illustrates
this double engagement.
A1941 exhibition, and issues of appropriation
For this exhibition, I draw especially from Nicholas T h o
mas ' account:
"Early in 1941, staff at the Australian M u s e u m began
to prepare an exhibition of Aboriginal art, together
with material that demonstrated the potential of its
applications" to fabrics, ceramics, and murals.27
" W h a t they were doing was not dissimilar to the
efforts of Canadian curators almost fifteen years ear
lier: 'Canadian West Coast Art: Native and Modern '
had presented a mix of indigenous pieces and work
by settler artists, with the former providing a deco
rative heritage ripe for harvest by the latter", a c o m
bination that "promised to establish a genuinely
national aesthetic. Essentially the same rhetoric met
with an enthusiastic response from Australian arts
and crafts practitioners, and around March it became
apparent that the museum ' s temporary display areas
might prove inadequate to the size of the exhibition.
The director ... took up an offer from David Jones -
an Australian equivalent of Harrods .. . to use their
auditorium".28
This store had a large art gallery and "even in 1940 included
a range of men's and women ' s clothes in 'colours true to the
pigment of the Aborigines'" and using "Arunta-derived"
designs.29 The material in the exhibition was a mixture
of Aboriginal artwork and of craft products from non-
Indigenous people, adapting Aboriginal motifs. The A b o
riginal material was the contribution of the m u s e u m :
"Australian M u s e u m staff went to considerable
lengths to obtain photographs of rock painting and
engravings and loans of weapons, utensils, sacred
objects and ornaments from collections in Melbourne
and Adelaide as well as around Sydney".30
Surprisingly, McCarthy was also modest in his claims for
the Aboriginal material and saw no difficulty in its
adaptation to help build a style that was distinctively
Australian. Nicholas Thomas cites his comments, m a d e
"in a press release, and in an article in the museum's m a g
azine".
"It is not contended that aboriginal art equals the
abstract and imaginative qualities, or the richness
of design, of the art of m a n y other primitive peo
ples, nor that it approaches the magnificence of the
art of the classical civilisations, but it m a y be claimed
that the variety and simplicity of the wide range of
motifs and equally numerous techniques .. . give it a
character sufficiently distinctive to identify it with
the people, and for this reason it m a y be said to rep
resent a definite phase of art in Australia. Adapted
with intelligence and taste, aboriginal art can m a k e a
unique contribution to modern Australian craft work
... In addition, the myths and legends, daily life and
art motifs, form an inspiration that m a y give rise to
a national decorative element in Australian architec
ture".31
S o m e other reviewers, Thomas notes, were more enthu
siastic:
"Best exhibits by far were the aboriginal bark-paint
ings .. . The aboriginal stuff was swell, but all m o d
ern application wasn't." S o m e were "horrible beyond
belief".32 "The barks showed 'the aboriginal to be a
sensitive artist with a true feeling for design'. The
paintings 'should be compared with the crude decora-
- " ibid., p.50.
2 1 ibid., p.50.
22ibid..p.51.
2 3 Specht, J.R. (1979) "Anthropology". In Strahan, R . (Ed.) (1979) Op.cit., p.144. Specht was
Head of Anthropology in 1979.
24ibid.,pp.l44-145.
2 5 ibid., p. 145.
ibid., p.146.
27ibid.,p.l20.
28ibid.,pp.l20-122.
2 9 ibid., p. 119.
ibid., p.123. Emphasis added.
31ibid.,pp.l23-124.
~ Review from Australia: National Journal, 1 September 1941, p.76. In T h o m a s , N . (1999)
Op.cit., p. 124.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «x MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 85
tion they have inspired on the glassware ... nearby".33
Changes in views about appropriation. It is extremely
unlikely that the M u s e u m in current times would repeat
its actions or McCarthy's endorsement of adaptations.
The appropriation of Aboriginal designs, however, was
c o m m o n during the 1950s and 1960s and issues of cop
yright did not become widely public topics until the
1980S/1990S. They are still contentious.34 There is, h o w
ever, the occasional report of a successful claim in court
for ownership of designs that had been appropriated,
without consent, for use on fabrics, rugs or items of
clothing.
A second sign of change is a shift in the evaluation
of Margaret Preston's contributions to the advancing
of Aboriginal art. During the 1940's, at times with the
assistance of McCarthy, Preston began
"to participate in the field trips of the Anthropological
Society .. . to study rock engravings around Sydney;
she also later travelled through central and north
ern Australia visiting Aboriginal communities, and
especially galleries of rock art . . . . She drew upon
Aboriginal art . . . by working with ochre-like colours
... by emulating what she took to be indigenous c o m
positional principles, by illustrating biblical subjects
in Aboriginal settings, and by reproducing rock art
fairly directly".35
Preston's work remains extremely popular within Aus
tralia. It is hung in m a n y galleries, and reproductions
appear in m a n y a h o m e , office, and waiting room. It
has taken some time, however, for two views to emerge
about her use of Aboriginal styles and designs in some of
her o w n paintings. O n the one hand, "Margaret Preston
has been praised by a number of writers for her forward-
looking appreciation of Aboriginal art".36 At the same
time, in Thomas ' words, "many of her statements about
'applying' Aboriginal art come d o w n to us today with
an unpleasant clang".37 S o m e critics go further, arguing
that "Preston's values were not in direct opposition to
and complicitly involved in the destruction of Aborigi
nal culture".38 Thomas ' o w n 1999 evaluation is that her
work drew "viewers' attention .. . toward the neglected
indigenous art traditions themselves. Those traditions
pointed in turn toward the indigenous presence, spot
lighting a stubborn and enduring obstacle to the idea of
settler nationhood".39 In effect, as long as the designs had
life, there could be no claim to an 'empty' land or to one
in which only whites and their productions were signifi
cant.
Moves Toward Change Before 1993
I noted in Chapter 3 that, even though watershed events
help provide a time frame for change, shifts in circum
stances and in m u s e u m practices can be noted before the
dates chosen as a marker.
The same situation applies in Australia, but the shifts
display a different form. In South Africa, the moves are
visible within separate m u s e u m s , largely on the initia
tives of individuals w h o saw the need and some oppor
tunities within their o w n settings. In Australia, there
are visible moves at a level that cut across m u s e u m s ,
could be described as part of a general ideology, and
took a particular direction: consultation with Indig
enous people. In the words of Phil Gordon, currently
Manager of the Australian M u s e u m Aboriginal Herit
age Unit and Acting Head of Anthropology:
" M u s e u m s in Australia have been actively involved in
reconciliation since the late 1970's, long before its rec
ognition as a formal political movement".4 0
The direction of this change - a strong orientation toward
consultation and 'new relationships' - can be seen in the
comments m a d e with regard to the 1978 U N E S C O semi
nar and to significant changes overseas. Kelly and Gor
don, for example, in a 2001 paper entitled "Developing A
Community Of Practice: Museums And Reconciliation In
Australia", describe the U N E S C O conference in the fol
lowing terms:
"In 1978 the U N E S C O regional seminar, Preserving
Indigenous Cultures: A New Role for Museums, was the
first time m u s e u m s and Indigenous people sat d o w n
together to talk about obligations and processes: the
obligations of museums to respect Indigenous rights to
their cultural heritage and addressing this within the
practices of museums at the time. Since then there
have been immense changes in h o w m u s e u m s have
86 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «n MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
dealt with these issues resulting in n e w relationships
forged between Australian m u s e u m s and Indigenous
peoples".41
Noted also by Kelly and Gordon is a Canadian report that
appeared in 1992 with the title "Turning the Page: Forg
ing New Relationships between Museums and Indigenous
people".42 The overall theme in both reports - a change in
the interconnections between m u s e u m s and Indigenous
people - is also the dominant motif in a further overseas
development that was well known to staff at the Austral
ian M u s e u m . This development was the 1990 passing
into law of N A G P R A (the North American Graves Pro
tection and Repatriation Act): an act preceded by protest
that began in 1974 with the formation of the American
Indian group, North Americans Against Desecration.
The passing of N A G P R A , and the long period of debate
before then, would have left no doubt about the need
for any m u s e u m to think broadly about items that could
contribute to tensions over control and ownership in the
course of steps towards new relationships.43
C . After 1993 :
Change 1 - Redesigning The Gallery
I have divided the changes after 1993 into two parts:
• 1995: The redesign of a gallery, transforming the 1985
exhibition on Aboriginal Australia. The redesign
was preceded by consultation with Aboriginals,
highlighted several current social issues, and used
Aboriginal voices for Aboriginal narratives.
• 1996: The establishment of an Aboriginal Heritage
Unit, with an Aboriginal as Head (Phil Gordon). The
Unit's task is to cover issues related to consultation,
repatriation, and outreach. It is also responsible for
the development of policies in relation to h u m a n
remains and secret or sacred objects: objects that raise
particular questions about decision-making power.
Each of those changes is large, raising questions about
both what has been done and might still be done: ques
tions relevant to the Australian M u s e u m and to other
museums.4 4
Points of Change from the 1985 Exhibition
The general sense of change in intention and practice is
signalled by the following statement:
"In 1995 the Australian M u s e u m decided to rede
velop the existing semi-permanent Aboriginal
Australia exhibition to present a contemporary view
of Indigenous people and deal with key issues arising
from the Royal Commission into Deaths in Custody
and reconciliation. A deliberate decision was taken by
the Museum to reflect current concerns and foreground
the voices of Australia's Indigenous people .... At that
time this was quite groundbreaking, requiring a
whole n e w way of approaching content development,
interpretation, audience research and consultation. It
meant a number of conceptual shifts for the M u s e u m :
from m u s e u m interpretations to Indigenous peo
ples' stories based on their o w n experiences; from
an object-focused exhibition to a thematic one based
on current issues of importance to Indigenous peo-
F r o m a review in the Sydney Morning Herald, cited by T h o m a s , N . (1999] Op.cit.. pp.124-
125.
As of December 2002, for example, government funding was halted for the National Indig
enous Arts Advisory Association ( N I A A A ) . It had been established three years earlier to
work on copyright problems and to issue labels of authenticity. Its standards and its lack of
accountability, however, were seen as less than adequate by both Aboriginal and n o n - A b o
riginal funding groups. Sydney Morning Herald, December 14, 2002, p.7.
T h o m a s , N . (1999) Op.cit., p. 134. Preston also donated two sandstone sculptures to the Art
Gallery, the first of their kind to be displayed.
i 0 ibid., p. 140.
3 7 Butel, E . (1988) cited by T h o m a s , N . ( 1999) Op.cit., p.140.
3 8 Stephen, A . (1980) cited by T h o m a s , N . (1999) Op.cit, p.141 39
T h o m a s , N . ( 1999) Op.cit., p. 143.
This is page 1 of the prepublished text: Kelly, L and Gordon, P. (2001) "Developing a C o m
munity of Practice: M u s e u m s and Reconciliation in Australia". In Sandell, R . (2001) Rheto
ric or Reality? Museums as Agents of Social Inclusion. Leicester: Leicester University,
ibid., p.l. Emphasis added.
" Kelly, L. , Gordon, P. and Sullivan, T. (2000) Evaluation of Previous Possessions, New Obliga
tions: Policies for Museums and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People. Green Paper
prepared for M u s e u m s Australia National Office. Also the 1990 Native American Graves
and Repatriation Act ( N A G P R A ) Cited also by Kelly, L and Gordon, P. (2001) (pp.14-15)
as a significant policy step: its later evaluation also served as the basis of a survey by Kelly,
L. , Gordon, P., and Sullivan, T . (2000) of the implementation in a number of Australian
m u s e u m s of the recommendations m a d e in the 1993 Australian M u s e u m s paper: Previous
Possessions, New Obligations.
The Act itself is available on www.usbr.gov/nagpra/neglaw.htm. Useful also are (1) c o m
ments by Steve Russell in 1997 (www.archaeology.miningco.com/library/weekly/aa83/197.
htm) and (2) a report issued by the Arctic Studies Center (www.mnh.si.edu/arctic/html.
repattb.html), prepared in 1995 by Tamara Bray at the Smithsonian's National M u s e u m
of Natural History.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 87
pie; and an emphasis on audiences researchjistening
and responding to a variety of stakeholders through
out the development of the exhibition".45
This is the exhibition described in Section A (A Visitor's
Eye View). Its sequence, as noted there, "moves people
from the familiar - they are people just like m e - telling
m e their stories in their o w n ways - to the unfamiliar,
dealing with confronting issues of dispossession, social
justice and the resulting fracturing of family and culture,
through a constructivist approach to learning".46 The
term constructivist is used in the sense that the viewer is
helped to actively build an interpretation of the material
presented.
Kelly and Gordon single out three aspects of con
tent, and two aspects of method as marking the nature
of change. A first aspect of content has to do with the
emphasis on "the Indigenous voice", conveyed primarily
by the use of oral history videos. These are found near
the entrance to the gallery. Stories cover both explana
tions of creationist tales as well as accounts of growing
up as an Aboriginal in rural Australia. They are interac
tive in the sense that the viewer can choose which story
to listen to.
The second is the focus on meanings (e.g. the m e a n
ings of land, of imagery such as the Rainbow Serpent, or
the relation of designs in art work to narratives of ori
gin and ownership) rather than the traditional m u s e u m
emphasis on objects. The third is the inclusion of social
justice issues. There is an explicit recognition of severe
injustices, with a focus on those already well publicised
(e.g. Deaths in Custody, The Stolen Generation). These
occasions form a strong part of the intention to cover
"current issues of importance to Aboriginal people".
Singled out also are two aspects of method. T h e
first has to do with actions taken during the course of
developing the exhibition, w h e n the team took several
steps as part of a 'front-end evaluation'. These steps
were meetings of "the Indigenous staff at the M u s e u m
to help develop key issues and interpretative strategies"
and "a series of communi ty seminars . . . and forums"
throughout the State.47 Ideally, one would hope to see
- especially for the benefit of other m u s e u m s - more
detail about this phase of 'consultation'. A s things stand
at the m o m e n t , there is only the tantalising footnote:
"In writing this paper it became clear that there are
m a n y interpretations of h o w this exhibit evolved,
its message and focus, as well as the roles of various
Project team member s . W e have concentrated on the
exhibition development from our personal perspec
tives: Indigenous, as Gordon is an Indigenous person
w h o undertook the bulk of the consultations, and
Evaluation, primarily projects undertaken by the
Head of the M u s e u m ' s Audience Research Centre
(Kelly)".48
The other aspect of method singled out is the use of visi
tor surveys (pre- and -post surveys) together with visi
tor tracking to check on time spent in toto and in vari
ous sections of the exhibition. The material cited brings
out the significance to the planners of shifting people's
interpretations of events toward a more positive view
of Aboriginal people: e.g. toward the kind of c o m m e n t
m a d e in a focus interview conducted six months after
the exhibition "to investigate long-term learning, impact
and change".
"Every time you hear about Aboriginals they're either
going to jail or fighting. [ N o w I'd] think w h y do they
always show this type of story? W h y don't they show
the nice story? "49
Expectations of Future Change
in the Exhibition
The current exhibition was expected to have a ten-year
life span. Changes of several kinds are being considered.
Anticipated is a change in the direction of strengthening
the Aboriginal voice, taking account of c o m m e n t to the
effect that the voice of the m u s e u m and the curator is
still strong.50
Anticipated also are changes in line with shifting
social justice issues. Changes will undoubtedly occur in
what are seen as significant issues to cover. These m a y
be areas of misunderstanding or lack of sensitivity on
the part of non-Indigenous visitors, or areas where there
is a sense of offence and omission on the part of Indig
enous viewers or representatives of Aboriginal c o m m u
nities. N e w issues have in fact already surfaced:
88 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
" A number of n e w issues .. . will impinge on future
planning and policy development in m u s e u m s . . . e.g.
strategies dealing with n e w media in the visual arts
such as video, film, music (especially the impact of
digitisation and rights of access, Native Title, intel
lectual property, and copyright)".51
Recognised also is need to consider other audiences.
Placement in the city raises questions of access for people
outside the city: an issue that applies in m a n y countries.
H o w are m u s e u m s to develop displays or accompanying
texts that will be regionally accessible or specifically rel
evant to particular communities? Placement in the city
also limits the extent to which one can determine the
interpretations m a d e of a display, or the feelings associ
ated with it, among people outside the city. D o Indige
nous Australians outside the city, for example, find the
current exhibition empowering, sympathetic, or relevant
to their concerns?
Planning for Audiences Outside
Metropolitan Areas
This last aspect of anticipated changes warrants a special
note. T w o features to contemporary museums give it par
ticular significance. O n e is a particular relevance to goals
that involve Indigenous groups. Most of this audience
is outside cities such as Sydney or Cape T o w n . They need
access to m u s e u m material. They also need to be part
of a museum's measure of impact. At the m o m e n t , in
most museums , "success ... is measured introspectively,
i.e., in terms of impact on the metropolitan audiences
rather than in benefit to Indigenous communities in
regions".52 The other reason is the increasing expectation
on the part of m a n y - Indigenous or not, within and out
side the city or even the country - that they should be
able to access m u s e u m material without directly visiting
the city or the m u s e u m .
H o w do m u s e u m s meet these expectations? A m o n g
the changes m a d e or considered by the Australian
M u s e u m , especially by its Aboriginal Heritage Unit,
are these:
• Internet material: The Unit has developed a large body
of material that is available and widely used, in both
city and rural areas and by both Indigenous and
non-Indigenous people. It is, however, all in print
and does not yet cover material developed within
communities.
• Developing exhibitions that can tour remote areas. O n e
challenge here is the task of determining what is
relevant and interesting to local audiences. W e
cannot assume, Phil Gordon notes, that all audiences
will be equally interested in the same material.53 A
central m u s e u m is then unlikely to meet community
participation needs by sending to different places
the same sets of moveable materials. The challenge,
Gordon comments in interview, is one that the Unit
is still mulling over, but with the increasing sense that
moveable 'museums in a box' are not the answer for
communities outside the city, especially if they are
Indigenous.
• Regional museums. Regional m u s e u m s increase the
possibilities of access. The issues to be worked
through, staff at the Unit note, have to do with
governance, resources, and adherence to the goal
of n e w relationships with Indigenous communities.
Central m u s e u m s are typically the responsibility
of either the national government or, more often,
the State government. Regional m u s e u m s are more
often the responsibility of local councils. Local
councils, however, usually have few resources, and
Metropolitan m u s e u m s do not find it easy to share
scarce resources with them. Local councils are also
Both are translations into practice of the principles expressed in the 1993 paper Previous
Possessions, New Obligations issued by the Australian M u s e u m s Association. The general
features of this paper, relevant to all types of m u s e u m s in Australia, have been described in
Chapter 2. The Australian M u s e u m accepted it as policy and as a sign of its commitment to
principles that "promote the primary rights of Indigenous people in their cultural material
held in m u s e u m collections, self-determination for Indigenous people in respect of cultural
heritage matters, and consultation with Indigenous people in the management of those
collections." Kelly, L , Gordon, P. and Sullivan, T . , (2000 ) Op.cit, p.8.
4 5 Kelly, L. and Gordon, P. (2001). Op.cit, p.8. Emphasis added.
46ibid.,p.l0.
4 ' ibid., p.10.
4 8 ibid., p.29: footnote 10.
49ibid.,p.l3.
Hodge, R . (1998) A Semwtic Analysis of the Australian Museum's Indigenous Australians:
Australia's First Peoples Exhibition. Report prepared for the Australian M u s e u m Audience
Research Centre (unpublished).
5 1 Kelly, L . , Gordon, P. and Sullivan, T. (2000) Op.cit., p. 18.
ibid., p.4.
Interview with Phil Gordon, February 2002.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 89
less likely to be familiar with the guidelines created
for contemporary m u s e u m practice in relation to
Indigenous representation. In Kelly, Gordon and
Sullivan's view of the future, success will call for
"strategies to encompass the three levels of Australian
governments (Commonwealth, State and local) . . . in
the regions where relationships with local government
are critical".54
• Providing training for non-city sites. Exhibition spaces
need not be limited to city sites or to regional
m u s e u m s . C o m m u n i t y interests might in fact be
better served by developing community sites where
the material chosen is particularly relevant to a
specific community and where the local community
is responsible for the development of the display, the
accompanying accounts, the security of material,
and the monitoring of visitor interest. This kind of
possibility is part of the development of interest in
what have come to be called 'Keeping Places'. 'Keeping
Places' are community centres, small regional
m u s e u m s , or private enterprises aimed at gathering
local knowledge and artefacts both for the local and
broader communities.55
If regional m u s e u m s or community centres are to work
well, however, and to continue the policies that are part
of ' new relationships', central m u s e u m s need to provide
training. The Australian M u s e u m has created an Out
reach program designed to "provide for Aboriginal c o m
munities within N S W access to professional m u s e u m
training and advice in the planning and running of their
o w n cultural centres and keeping places".56 The training
covers short familiarisation visits as well as long term
programs in areas ranging from anthropology to security
and marketing. The challenge again is one of resources.
Training was an integral part of the original creation of
the Heritage Unit and the transformation of the m u s e u m
toward being a more open and inclusive entity. Those
starting funds, however, have dried up, leaving the provi
sion of resources for the m o m e n t to local governments.57
D. After 1993 : Change 2 -
The Aboriginal Heritage Unit
Three reasons underlie the attention given to this Unit.
First, the Unit illustrates organisational change. With
out that kind of shift, the good intentions that give rise
to exhibitions m a y not be sustained. Second, it operates
within an explicit conceptual framework: the notion of
'communities of practice'. Third, in the course of describ
ing its operations, it helps us get beneath the surface of
broad goals such as 'new relationships' or 'community
participation'.
To bring out those features, this section notes first
the Unit's administrative place within the M u s e u m and
the general responsibilities assigned to it. Noted then
are the nature of the Unit's conceptual framework and
the need to specify the steps and tensions involved in
working toward goals such as 'communities of prac
tice'. Those steps are noted first in general terms and
then in relation to three specific functions. These have
to do with developing (a) community participation, (b)
policies with regard to h u m a n remains, and (c) policies
with regard to secret/sacred material.
General Responsibilities and
Administrative Position
Established in January 1996, the Unit is charged with two
overall goals essentially related to two sets of people. The
first is to "assist Australian Indigenous communities in
gaining access to their cultural heritage, creating a suf
ficient skill base to allow communities to manage their
cultural heritage".58 This goal includes providing c o m
munities with "sufficient information" about the cultural
material stored at the m u s e u m for them to be able to give
the M u s e u m their opinion or advice on the management
of these collections on an on-going process.59 The second
large goal is to educate "the wider community, govern
ment agencies and departments on issues relating to the
maintenance of Indigenous cultural heritage".60
Administratively, the current exhibition on Indig
enous Australians n o w appears under the auspices of
the Heritage Unit rather that the original auspices of
the Anthropology Division. The change in terms carries
90 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <v MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
fewer connotations of academic topics, prehistory, or
exotically different groups.
The Unit is still, however, part of the Anthropology
Division and staff m a y be listed as belonging to both.
Phil Gordon, for example, is both Manager of the A b o
riginal Heritage Unit and Acting Head of the Anthro
pology Division. The Unit is also part of the museum's
general table of organisation. The m u s e u m as a whole
is part of the Ministry for the Arts of the N S W Gov
ernment. The Minister for the Arts appoints a Trust of
nine persons w h o are responsible for establishing policy
"consistent with its role and powers as defined in the
Act".61 The m u s e u m is expected, however, to be guided
not only by the Trust and by m u s e u m staff but also by
Aboriginal communities: "In cultural heritage mat
ters the Australian M u s e u m is guided by principles of
self-determination by Indigenous Australians".62 "Self-
determination" here means that:
"the M u s e u m talks with Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander communities in order to gain their opinion
and their advice about the current and future protec
tion and management items of Aboriginal heritage
and culture in the M u s e u m ' s care".63
The responsibility for gaining such opinion and advice
rests mainly with the Aboriginal Heritage Unit.
Conceptual Framework
M u s e u m practices m a y be described singly or grouped
according to their type. S o m e , for example, are related to
methods of collection, some to methods of display, some
to patterns of decision-making. The Aboriginal Heritage
Unit offers a more conceptual linkage. In Kelly and Gor
don's terms, the aim is to develop "communities of prac
tice": The phrase refers to a state of affairs in which two
or more parties move toward a shared understanding of
goals, means, and each other's positions and - the impli
cations of practice - toward shared or mutually under
stood ways of acting or of resolving differences. The term
comes from studies of organisations and groups where
success depends on such shared meanings and forms of
action and where the process of learning is one of move
ment toward that kind of state.64
This conceptual framework has the advantage of
specifying the kinds of end-states that one m a y hope
to reach, making terms such as 'new relationships' less
abstract. At the least, people move toward an increased
understanding of each other's orientation. Ideally, they
move also toward shared views of events. Even more
ideally, change is towards shared ways of doing things:
shared ways, for example, of making decisions, present
ing arguments, negotiating difficulties or solving prob
lems. In effect, what comes to be shared m a y be of more
than one kind and m a y exhibit some progression from
one kind of sharing to another.
In addition to helping one specify what might come
to be shared, this conceptual framework has the advan
tage of usually containing a strong emphasis on the
steps by which shared goals, meanings, or ways of act
ing are achieved. A variety of situations has been used
to illustrate steps toward a desired end-state. Shifts in
the position of apprentices, preacher-congregation rela
tionships, and school-community co-operations are
some of these. Cutting across these situations is the
argument that the acquisition of skill or understanding
alters not only the individual but also the relationship
between that individual and others (e.g., other train
ees, other members of a guild or a class). For people of
equal status but starting from different positions (e.g.
m u s e u m staff and m u s e u m visitors), these steps are
likely to involve giving up some comfortable 'old-shoe'
beliefs and expectations: some old divisions, for exam-
Kelly, L - , G o r d o n , P. and Sullivan, T . (2000) Op.cit., p .5 .
T h e Australian M u s e u m , through the Aboriginal Heritage Unit, created a C D - R O M in 2002
o n the development of four different Aboriginal Cultural Centres and Keeping Places for
use b y other groups planning to develop similar centres: Keeping Culture: Achieving Self-
determination through the Development of Aboriginal Cultural Centres and Keeping Places.
Sydney: T h e Austrahan M u s e u m .
Mission Statement for the Australian M u s e u m ' s Aboriginal Heritage Unit, p.3.
Interview with Phil G o r d o n , February 2002.
Mission Statement. Op.cit., p.l.
ibid., p .3 .
ibid.,p.l.
ibid., p.l.
" ibid., p .2 .
ibid., p .2 .
Reference is to Kelly, L . and G o r d o n , P. (2001) Op.cit. T h e term c o m e s especially from the
w o r k of lean Lave and Etienne Wenger . See Lave, J., & Wenge r , E . (1991) Situated Learning:
Legitimate Peripheral Participation. N e w York: Cambr idge University Press: and Wenge r , E .
(19981 Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Ldentity. Cambr idge : Cambr idge
University Press.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION n* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 91
pie, between 'self and 'other'. For those classed initially
as beginners or 'novices', change consists of a m o v e
toward 'full' or 'legitimate' participation in the activ
ity of a group. For those classed initially in the position
of experts - by themselves or others - change usually
requires them to relinquish some established forms of
control or status, to yield various aspects of responsibil
ity to those initially classed as less expert, and perhaps
even to redefine w h o is to be regarded as 'expert'.
Kelly and Gordon see a community of practice as a
state already achieved in Australia:
" M u s e u m s in Australia and the Indigenous c o m m u
nities that they work with have formed a community
of practice: a learning community sharing c o m m o n
goals and developing sets of practices within a social
relationship built over time, a community that con
tinues to grow and shape its future".65
Kelly and Gordon also comment , however, on several
of the tensions and difficulties that need to be worked
through, or have been faced, in the course of moving
toward the desired end-state. This kind of material is not
as pronounced in m u s e u m descriptions as it is in stud
ies explicitly concerned with the nature of 'learning' or
'development'. Several interesting aspects to the course
of moving toward an achieved community of practice,
however, are noted in the material related to three spe
cific functions for the Unit. These have to do with devel
oping (1) community participation, (2) policies related to
h u m a n remains, and (3) policies related to secret/sacred
material. It is this specifically museum-relevant material
that others m a y find especially useful.
Function 1: Community Participation
W h a t is involved in moving toward this desired end-state?
S o m e tensions, Kelly, Gordon and Sullivan note, appeared
even in the first consultations that preceded the 1993
paper on Previous Possessions, New Obligation. The two
parties are m u s e u m staff and Aboriginal communities:
"The tensions in the consultations leading to the
development of the policy framework primarily con
cerned the means by which the 'different and vary
ing interests' in the collections and interpretation
of Indigenous cultural heritage were effectively bal
anced".66
Moving forward, Kelly and Gordon add, calls for m u s
eums to relinquish some of the control they are accus
tomed to exercise over materials and practices:
" m u s e u m s need to act as facilitators and partners
rather than as patriarchal institutions imposing
their views and practices on the peoples whose cul
tural material they hold This has required a major
re-think of m a n y areas of museological practice in
Australia, specifically in anthropological and archae
ological research, collection management, conserva
tion and public programs".67
To be relinquished also is the reliance only on the voice
of the m u s e u m or of the exhibition planner or manager:
"the focus of m u s e u m s needed to change from con
centrating on objects to the meanings that they have
within a cultural context, explained by Indigenous
people in their o w n ways . . . . The employment of
Indigenous people within m u s e u m s across a range of
disciplines played a pivotal role in influencing atti
tudes and practice".68
Whether those ' o w n ' explanations should come from
Indigenous people within m u s e u m s or within c o m m u
nities and h o w far these two possible sets of voices match,
are still open questions. Less in question is the continued
presence of difficulty, for m a n y m u s e u m s across Aus
tralia, of engaging in advance consultation with people
outside their o w n m u s e u m staff. In their 2001 review of
h o w the principles of the Association's 1993 paper had
been converted into practice, for example, Kelly, Gor
don and Sullivan found 'advance consultation' to be still
an area that m u s e u m s found difficult. Difficult also was
the feeding back of research findings to the c o m m u n i
ties from which collections, oral or material, had been
drawn.69
92 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Function 2: Policies and Actions Related to
H u m a n Remains
The development of policies and actions with regard to
h u m a n remains is sometimes considered together with
the treatment of secret/sacred objects. Both are certainly
part of claims for repatriation. Especially for Austral
ian Aboriginals, however, secret objects and restricted
audiences have a particular cultural significance, and
I accordingly treat them separately from the topic of
h u m a n remains. For each, however, one m a y ask about
the nature of policies, the specific steps and tensions that
arise, and the extent to which policies are easily turned
into practice.
Kelly and Gordon provide an example of a first step,
in the form of some general principles:
"The notion that the m u s e u m retained unilateral
rights to decide the disposition of h u m a n remains
and secret/sacred material was rejected. Instead, it
was recognised that the m u s e u m has an obligation to
consult with the relevant Indigenous community and
put all information on the items to them before seek
ing their approval to retain these for research".70
" M u s e u m s should not hold any items which are not
of scientific or cultural importance. This most espe
cially applies to h u m a n remains. M u s e u m s should
adopt policies in respect of the h u m a n remains of
all peoples irrespective of race. The utmost sen
sitivity must be observed in dealing with h u m a n
remains. This policy applies to all h u m a n remains of
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people irrespec
tive of age." (Age here refers to historical age, m e a n
ing that the early-era quality of remains gives them
no special status.)71
A further general principle recognises the likelihood of
competing interests and of the need for negotiated pro
cedures:
"At all times, attempts will be m a d e to avoid or recon
cile conflicts of interest between the M u s e u m ' s scien
tific and educational role and its role as an aware and
responsible custodian of such remains".72
That principle explicitly acknowledges conflicts of int
erest. W h a t one also looks for - and will presumably
find as the Unit moves toward documenting its goals
and procedures - are the ways in which "conflicts of inter
est" are worked through. W h e n it comes to the weight
given to "scientific and educational roles", for example,
w h o establishes priorities? W h o , for instance, determines
the kind of question raised in the United States with
regard to h o w m a n y skeletal remains of North Ameri
can Indians need to be retained for cur-rent or possible
research purposes? At the m o m e n t , one review notes, the
Smithsonian Institution holds over 2 000 remains trans
ferred to the Institute around 1990 from the A r m y Medi
cal M u s e u m . (The Smithsonian in total "houses about 28
500 sets of skeletal remains, with approximately 17 600
of these being of Native Americans").73 At what point do
institutions make their holdings public and specify the
research purposes that justify the number of remains
that they hold?
In the proposals and reports from the Aborigi
nal Heritage Unit, the specific steps to be followed are
more specific w h e n it comes to the flow of information
between m u s e u m s and communities. N e w research on
h u m a n remains should be approved from the start by
Aboriginal communities:
"Before scientific research of any kind is carried out
on h u m a n remains the relevant community, having
been able to consider all appropriate information
available to the m u s e u m , must give permission for
that research. The results of any scientific research
must be communicated effectively to that c o m m u
nity".74
Kelly, L. and Gordon, P. (2001) Op.cit., p.l.
6 6 Kelly, L., Gordon, P. and Sullivan, T. ( 2000) Op.cit. p.8.
6 7 Kelly, L. and Gordon, P. (2001) Op.cit,p.5.
68ibid.,p.5.
6 9 Kelly, L., Gordon, P. and Sullivan, T. (2000) Op.cit.
7 0 Kelly, L. and Gordon, P. (2001) Op.cit, p.8.
Aboriginal Heritage Unit Mission Statement Op.cit, p.12.
7 2 ibid, p. 13.
From a report by the Arctic Studies Center (www.mnh.si.edu/arctic/html/repattb.htmll, pre
pared in 1995 by Tamara Bray at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History.
Aboriginal Heritage Unit Mission Statement. Op.cit, p , 13.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 93
In the reverse direction, requests for return call first for
the m u s e u m providing information as to what is held. At
the Australian M u s e u m , these requests also require sev
eral approvals:
"should requests for the return of objects be received,
they must be approved by all appropriate Aboriginal
people with recognised rights of access to the objects,
the Australian M u s e u m Aboriginal Heritage Unit,
the M u s e u m ' s Aboriginal Advisory Board and the
M u s e u m Trust".75
In both directions - providing information on a muse
u m ' s holdings and gaining approvals from several
sources - those procedures appear to involve a complex
set of approvals. Examples of h o w they work out in prac
tice would n o w be a desirable addition. The same point
applies to the museum's development of a data-base of
Aboriginal skeletal remains and burial places. In a 2002
interview, Gordon comments that farmers have been
k n o w n to hide or m o v e skeletal remains because of con
cerns that their presence might conceivably be used as
part of a Land Rights claim. Gordon considers that the
hiding or removal of remains has decreased somewhat
in recent years, with 'panic' dropping in the course of
clarifications with regard to farmers' established claims
and the limits to Native title. This kind of detail, h o w
ever, helps flesh out the picture of h o w some particular
circumstances affect the course of moving toward the
achievement of "communities of practice".
T w o last aspects that invite tensions to be worked
through have to do with the pace of decisions, and the
extent to which various aboriginal groups hold the
same views about h u m a n remains and reburial. O n the
first score, one looks forward to the provision of detail
about the number and the state of decisions. If out
comes at the South African M u s e u m (Chapter 3) and at
the Smithsonian are a guide, resolutions will be slow. As
of 1995 at the Smithsonian, for example, 15 repatriations
are described as completed, 12 others as in progress, and
a total of 35 requests as "on file".76
O n the second score, it cannot be assumed that all
indigenous groups will have the same views and expec
tations with regard to the return of h u m a n remains. I
noted in Chapter 3, for example, that a m o n g North
American Indians there are k n o w n to be differences
between the Zuni and other groups. The Zuni do not
wish remains to be returned until they work out puri
fication ceremonies that will undo the mishandling of
bodies in the course of their acquisition and their being
housed in museums . 7 7
At this point, it is not k n o w n whether Indigenous
groups will also vary in their expectations as to h o w
repatriation should be handled. It seems quite possible,
for example, that groups such as the Tiwi m a y differ
from other groups. The Tiwi are the people responsi
ble for the burial poles held by the Art Gallery in Syd
ney (these are detailed in Chapter 8). They are k n o w n
to hold strong views about the construction of burial
poles and the avoidance of burial sites until the poles,
and the bodies related to them, have both turned into
ash. Whether people such as the Tiwi hold particular
views also about m u s e u m holdings and forms of repa
triation, or whether Indigenous expectations have some
'pan-Indigenous' quality to them, however, is so far not
known. 7 8
All told, the road forward where h u m a n remains
are involved will clearly not be without interesting dif
ficulties. Offered also, however, is the opportunity for
observing in detail h o w some general principles are
worked out in practice and where difficulties or creative
solutions occur.
Function 3: Secret/Sacred Objects and
Restricted Audiences
It is probably easy to understand objections to the misuse
of objects that are felt to be sacred, to be objects of reli
gious veneration or tradition, or parts or religious tradi
tion. The desecration of churches, the breaking of grave
stones for the making of roads (gravestones targeted as
belonging to 'the other'), the burning of sacred books,
the 'obscene' use of ritual objects for a Black Mass, the
adding of dung to a portrait of the M a d o n n a , the trad
ing or unrestricted handling of religious objects that are
meant to be handled by a dedicated and cleansed group,
the fouling of any kind of what is felt to be pure: All of
these actions m a y readily strike a chord, regardless of the
particular country or group.
Where 'sacred' objects are concerned, then, shared
94 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
understanding m a y be relatively easy to achieve. Here
is an area where respect for the sensitivities of 'the other'
m a y readily come into play. 'Secret' objects, however,
m a y require more of an effort to understand. W h a t
are they and w h y would strong objections be made to
their display? Within Australia, the issue emerges in
more than one type of m u s e u m (within this book, for
example, it reappears in relation to Sydney's Art Gal
lery: Chapter 8). It is also a concern in South Africa's
National Art Gallery (Chapter 7) and in the develop
ment of North American Indian policy ( N A G P R A ) .
The significance of restricted audiences then becomes
important to understand both for the Australian set
ting, and because that setting can help bring out w h y
the issue matters elsewhere.
In theory, the notion of some things being secret -
some matters not being shared - should not be difficult
to grasp. In all societies, Foucault argues, knowledge is
regulated. It is a commodity held by a restricted group,
passed on only to a chosen few when they have met cer
tain requirements.79
In theory also, the notion of audience restrictions
because material is inappropriate or offensive to some
people should not be difficult to grasp. Non-Indigenous
people, for example, are accustomed to restrictions
in the form of films being classified by the age of the
expected audience ("for mature audiences only", "for
general audiences", "parental guidance recommended"
etc). In Australia, television programs are also increas
ingly often preceded by advice to the effect that "some
audiences m a y find the following program offensive: it
contains mature language, sex, violence, drug use".
Nonetheless the gap between Aboriginal concerns
and the level of understanding a m o n g non-Aboriginals
appears to be large. The size of the misunderstand
ing - in relation to television this time - is indicated by
a commen t made in 1988 by the anthropologist Eric
Michaels:
"The only national network, the publicly funded
Australian Broadcasting Service, has a near-crimi
nal record to date. It is not unusual to view programs
containing restricted secret rituals and other viola
tions of Aboriginal copyright. The Corporation sim
ply has no existing policy on the matter".80
W h y should Aboriginal concerns with what is secret
present particular difficulties? The areas of difficulty
emerge as having to do with the kinds of material that are
regarded as needing to be restricted, the dimensions
used to divide audiences, and - in both respects - the
degrees of difference between one group's expecta
tions and another's. Those sources of non-shared views
are especially apparent in relation to Aboriginal and
non-Aboriginal positions. The breakdown of sources,
however, is one that could be applied to any setting.
In Aboriginal groups, for example, the controlled com
modities go beyond those that non-Indigenous people are
accustomed to. The commodities include, for example,
knowledge of the law, visual designs, songs, dances, sto
ries, ceremonies. Issues of control and of restricted audi
ences are then more part of everyday awareness. There
is also little attachment to the view that the ideal is one
of knowledge being 'public', available to all. In Michaels'
description:
"Knowledge in the form of stories and songs is the pre
rogative of senior m e n and w o m e n (elders) and the
rules governing its transmission are highly regulated.
Violating speaking constraints and rights is treated as
theft ... Mode rn mass media is based on a contrast
ing and subversive principle .. . information is m a d e
to appear ostensibly free .. . c o m m o n property avail
able to huge publics".81
Non-Aboriginals might move more easily toward shared
understanding w h e n the commodity concerned can be
thought of as in some sense 'owned' by particular people
or subject to a form of 'copyright'. This type of restric
tion has parallels in non-Aboriginal culture. W h a t is
restricted, however, and when restrictions apply, m a y
ibid., p.8.
Report at the Arctic Studies Center: twww.mnh.si.edu/arctic/html.repattb.html), prepared in
1995 by Tamara Bray at the Smithsonian's National M u s e u m of Natural History.
' www.usbr.gov/nagpra/neglaw.htm.
For a brief account of Tiwi beliefs about the origin of death, the significance of rituals related
to death, and the place of carved and decorated burial poles, see Crumlin, R. (1991) Op.clt.
Foucault, M . (1980) Power/Knowledge: Selected Writing and Other Essays. London: Brighton
and Harvester Press.
Michaels, E . (1990) Op.cit., p.22. The c o m m e n t is from the article published in 1990, but
written in 1988, the year of Michaels' death.
11 Michaels, E . (1986) Op.cit, p.22.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <w MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 95
go beyond those areas. Occasions of death provide an
example. A n individual's death m a y preclude, again with
the possible exception of some elders and particularly in
the presence of relatives, the display of songs, dances or
objects associated with an individual, references to his or
her name , or reproductions of his or her voice. Restric
tions such as these m a y present particular difficulties.
The audience restrictions are also extensive. A n y
expectation that public viewing or 'family-unit' view
ing will be the accepted norm, for example, is unlikely
to fit Aboriginal expectations. Typically, the require
ments for being part of a legitimate audience have to
do with both gender and initiation as an adult. S o m e
forms of knowledge, for example, are classed as 'men's
business' or 'women ' s business'. Control over audi
ences is also expected, however, in order to respect
avoidance relationships a m o n g people w h o should not
be in close contact with one another. Langton provides
an example of violated expectations in this regard, c o m
menting on practices in mission-run or government-
run places:
"Films were often shown as part of lessons - school or
Bible- and a prepared interpretation usually pro
ceeded and followed the showing. Implicitly, the social
structuring of the audience was manipulated
by the settings, school or church halls Here . . . it
was very difficult to maintain the traditional restric
tions on association. Mothers-in-law would be seated
too close to sons-in-law, and young 'promised wives'
would be apt to be accessible to too m a n y inappropri
ate and unauthorized suitors".82
That kind of example makes it clear that audience restric
tions do not apply only to what non-Aboriginals m a y see
or be told. Restricted audiences are strongly expected to
apply also within Aboriginal groups. Hodge makes this
point especially clear in a comment on paintings made
by the Warlpiri on the school doors at Yeundumu. These
were intended as a way of introducing a younger gen
eration to traditional art forms. The doors have since
become part of several public exhibitions and the subject
of a book. That book, Hodge points out, has a longer text
in Warlpiri than in English and the description of the
'keys' to the paintings is noticeably brief, even in Warlpiri.
Those features, Hodge continues, reflect two intentions.
O n e has to do with "the Warlpiri's deliberate withhold
ing of meaning from Europeans", a "specific, politically
motivated suppression of meaning". The other is the
maintenance of Warlpiri discursive strategies among
themselves: "full knowledge is carefully controlled and
withheld from most members even of the core of society
in the interests of power and territoriality".83
M u s e u m possibilities
In the face of these barriers to shared meanings and
practices, what m u s e u m changes are called for or likely
to occur? O n e is the withdrawal from public viewing
of material k n o w n to be intended for restricted audi
ences. For material that has a continuing restriction (e.g.,
intended only for initiated adults, or only for w o m e n
or m e n ) , m u s e u m s can make that a permanent action.
They can return this type of material to the community
for local control, or they can place objects in restricted
parts of the museum's space. As w e shall see in Chapter 8,
the Art Gallery in Sydney has a space set aside for objects
that are for viewing only by a restricted group of people.
For material that is restricted on the basis of death,
actions seem to be less clear. There is first of all the need
for death to be k n o w n . There is also the potential prob
lem of large amounts of material needing to be with
drawn from display. The solution visible in Australian
m u s e u m s at the m o m e n t is the withdrawal of the n a m e
that m a y accompany a piece of work, with a brief text
explaining that the n a m e is left blank because of the
recent death of the associated person. To be worked out
with the local community is then the length of time that
this partial withdrawal should apply. The A B C d e m o n
strates a further type of action. Particularly when there
is a re-run of a program that includes Aboriginal peo
ple, an advance statement on screen advises that the
program m a y b e offensive to some: some of the people
shown m a y have died since the program was made . As
in the case of other forms of advice about what m a y
be offensive, the initiative is then felt to belong to the
viewer. The viewer should withdraw.
Once again, the moves toward the resolution of dif
ferences and of the tensions between varying expec
tations are not likely to be without problems. Those
96 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
problems may, in fact, increase over time rather than
decrease. Aboriginal groups, for example, have in some
areas become more wary about what they display to
outsiders and about the explanations they provide. That
move is best documented in the case of art from the
area of Papunya, where a brief initial wave of open-ness
in 1971-1972 gave way to more concealment within the
art that was sent outside the community for sale. The
concealment took several forms: concealment in what
was painted, in the degree of overlay used for an under
lying meaning, and in the explanations offered to peo
ple w h o wished to k n o w what a painting 'meant'.84 The
move, however, was not in the direction of making one
group's meanings and understandings more apparent to
the other.
In contrast, there are some signs of changes toward
understanding on the non-Aboriginal side. I have noted
already moves toward the recognition that death is
expected to bring with it some particular restrictions
on what can be shown or said. More broadly, terms such
as 'men's business' and 'women's business' have come to
be part of general non-Indigenous language. They have
been made highly public by several court cases: cases
that involved, for example, the acceptance of restricted
court access to accounts of w h y some particular areas
of land should not be made available for open develop
ment.
H o w shifts of this kind m a y be advanced is still an
open question. One step forward, however, m a y consist
of the kind of argument offered earlier in this section.
This is the recognition that all societies place audience
restrictions on what is supposed to be k n o w n or seen.
Aboriginal groups simply place restrictions in areas,
and on some bases, that are different from those that
non-Indigenous groups have come to take for granted.
O n e further step consists of noting in detail the
kinds of actions that communities take when they are in
charge of deciding what will be made part of any record
and h o w viewing will be arranged. That kind of mate
rial is yet to come from m u s e u m accounts. A concrete
example of this kind of step, however, is to be found
within Eric Michaels' accounts of Aboriginal c o m m u
nity involvement in video production.85
Michaels offers detailed accounts of events related
to productions dealing with several topics: the Conis-
ton Massacre, a Warlpiri Fire Ceremony, the painting of
the Y u e n d u m u school doors. Noted in these accounts
are several occasions of pinpointing areas of difference
between the Warlpiri and the non-Indigenous members
of the team. These areas included, for example, w h o
speaks on whose behalf, w h o is positioned before or
behind the camera, w h o turns up on various occasions.
For m y present purposes, I note especially some
details from the report of a video made of a meeting
between a group of Warlpiri and members of the Edu
cation Department at Alice Springs. (The meeting was
on a contested topic). Robert Hodge offers a summary
description:
" A group made the four-hour journey to Alice Springs,
and the Y u e n d u m u Video Unit taped the whole meet
ing, as did representatives of C A A M A the Aboriginal
media unit, and the A B C . Dave Japanangka articu
lated the rationale for this procedure: ' W e want this
to be videotaped so that w e can prove w e really did
come here, and so the Education Department can't
lie about what was said'. As Michaels reports it, the
community edited d o w n 12 hours of meeting to a sin
gle 3-hour tape, whose technical quality was medio
cre but whose reach was impressive (approximately
4500 people saw it within two weeks). This tape 'gal
vanised audiences, w h o sat riveted for three hours, in
almost every community I observed'." Sb
I cite that example for two reasons. O n e is that it illus
trates one way of getting closer to the specifics of what
occurs when people move toward community partici
pation, consultation, or communities of practice. The
other is that it provides an example of an issue that the
Australian M u s e u m highlights. This issue is the presence
of events in media other than museums. In any setting,
museums do not provide the only source of information,
8 2 Langton, M . (1993) Opxit, p.26.
Hodge, R. ( 1990) In Continuum: Communication and Tradition - Essays after Eric Michaeh.
A n Australian Journal of the Media, 3, p.213 Bardon, G . (1991) Papunya Tula: Art of the
Western Desert. Ringwood, Victoria: McPhee Dribble.
See, for example, Michaels' 1986 description of some forms of co-production and discussion
in The Aboriginal Invention of Television in Central Australia, 19X2-1985. Canberra: Austral
ian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, Institute Report.
8 6 Hodge, R. (1990) Op.cit, pp. 220-221. (Book in memory of Michaels).
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 97
entertainment, or political challenge. In this sense, they
operate 'in context'. The time is ripe to look more closely
at h o w events in other media influence challenges and
changes in the lives of museums.
E. A Highlighted Issue:
Challenge And Change In
Other Media
I ended Chapter 3 with a special topic, one highlighted by
a particular m u s e u m but raising issues relevant to many.
For the South African M u s e u m , this topic stemmed from
the withdrawal of the Bushman diorama: an action rais
ing issues related to the ways in which museums treat
and display bodies.
The Australian M u s e u m highlights a further topic
that cuts across museums . This is the extent to which
calls for change, and changes, are occurring within
other media. Noted before, especially in Chapter 2,
were differences among countries in the extent to
which m u s e u m groups have access to and are aware of
m u s e u m changes in other countries. The focus here,
however, is on changes within a country, across media
such as film, television, radio, print or music.
This issue comes up again at the end of Chapter 7,
as part of questions about the expectations of various
audiences. At this point, however, I focus on some first
answers to the question: W h a t happens in other media
that is relevant to museums?
First, other media provide a background from which
to view challenges and changes. A call for change in a
m u s e u m , for example, has a different meaning if m u s
eums are the first or the last area in which this call is
made .
Second, other media m a y provide a ready-made
'bank' of examples from which challengers or change-
makers m a y draw. Here already m a y be precedents to
strengthen one's case or examples to borrow, adapt, or
avoid. W h e n it comes to claims for restricted viewing in
museums , for example restrictions that m a y be at odds
with a prevailing ethos of open or public viewing - it
makes sense to ask: W h a t happens in other media?
The media of particular interest in the Australian
setting are those of film and television.87 These provide
especially examples of challenge and change in relation
to several aspects of process - access, independent pro
duction, and reviewing - and of content.
Challenge and Change in Access,
Production, and Reviewing
A great deal has been said in m u s e u m and other settings
about participation, consultation, and ownership: goals
that allow a great deal of leeway in their interpretation.
Film and media provide examples of h o w they m a y be
enacted in practice. Those of particular interest in the
present case are enactments where Indigenous c o m m u
nities have moved toward control over several aspects of
what participation etc. m a y cover.
Access. Several Aboriginal communities, of the
kind often named as 'traditional', have developed
explicit policies with regard to community approval
of film or video material dealing with topics in which
they had an interest, and with regard to access to Abrig-
inal land, and the employment of Aboriginals as actors
or as informants. As Marcia Langton points out (in a
comment drawn from a 1987 report by Mackinolty and
Duffy):
"During the making of Crocodile Dundee II, tradi
tional owners were attacked for being greedy, for
sucking payment from filmmakers w h o wished to
use their land, and, it was argued, for being 'obstruc
tive towards the film industry' ".88
Museums then were not the first to move toward c o m
munities being involved in decisions. Available to m u s
eums was already a clear example of the ways in which
communities might themselves define the nature of their
participation in any partnership.
Independent production and reviewing
Beginning in the 1980's, at least one traditional group
- the Warlpiri - had moved toward the production of
material that would be widely seen among Aborigi
nal groups. The examples below are based on Michaels'
detailed accounts:
98 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °°» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
"For the three years (1983-6), Warlpiri people at
Y u e n d u m u in the Northern Territories, Australia
learned the technology of video production, h o w to
create and manage a 'pirate' low-power transmis
sion facility and the economic and political realities
of fighting the world of T V broadcasting. They pro
duced hundreds of hours of videotape productions,
invented ways to make and show their works that
would not violate their o w n values. They established
the Warlpiri Media Association so that they could
continue to function after the research project ended.
Three years after the study was concluded, they con
tinue to produce n e w tapes and narrowcast their pro
grams".89
The second Warlpiri example is a non-commercial film
that illustrates a strong community involvement in deci
sions about both the process of production and the
nature of community reviewing. The film dealt with a
major fire ceremony, and I shall draw especially from
Langton's summary of its history.90
For this ceremony, Langton notes, there was a 1967
version made by Roger Sandell, with interpretations by
the anthropologist Nicholas Peterson, and a 1986 video-
recording by Andrew Jepaljarri Spencer. By 1988, h o w
ever, both of these "had become restricted from public
viewing because of the deaths of participants and the
showing of particular totemic designs .. . . Usually, only
senior initiated m e n or senior L a w w o m e n could view
these productions. Only they have the authority to look
at images of people w h o have died and of sacred designs
and to permit their showing to wider audiences".91
Still needed, however, was a version that could be
shown to novices "so that the religious and cultural tra
ditions could be passed on", together with "sequences .. .
(that) could be shown to the uninitiated and to the gen
eral public".92 A n edited version of the 1967 film, made
by a different clan within the Warlpiri, might on the
surface be seen as meeting these needs, but that would
upset the balance of the group.
The end result was a fourth version, made by two
independent filmmakers (one of these was the Aborigi
nal producer, Rachel Perkins), funded by several groups,
guided by senior Warlpiri w h o acted as ritual managers,
and widely reviewed in ways that were regarded as cul
turally appropriate. Senior Warlpiri viewed it first, but
they were not the only people to do so:
"Constant viewing and screening ... took place at the
old Warlukurlanga building because no one had died
in the vicinity recently .. . the building had doors on
each side so people could leave to comply with kin
ship avoidance relationships. Cassettes were also cir
culated in the community and aired through televi
sion transmitters so that viewings could take place at
people's houses".93
This type of film was not made for commercial distri
bution. There are, however, increasingly films made for
general distribution and with an eye to commercial suc
cess as well as ways of reminding the non-Aboriginal
world of Aboriginal experience and a continuing Aborig
inal presence. The last few years, for example, have seen
the emergence of several films that have been commer
cially successful, have w o n film awards, and have added
to knowledge and awareness of Aboriginals on the part
of the non-Indigenous, both locally and internationally.
Examples are films such as Radiance, The Rabbit-Proof
Fence, The Tracker, and One Night the Moon. In effect,
there is n o w no shortage of examples of Aboriginals'
involvement, empowerment, competence and persua
siveness in this med ium.
Are actions of this kind, however, directly relevant to
museums? They obviously alter the states of mind and
the background knowledge that visitors bring to muse
u m s , and a museum's choice of topics to use as a focus
for displays. Those actions, however, do not transfer
For an analysis of South African examples, a major source is Tomaselli, K . G . (1996)
Appropriating Images: The Semiotics of Visual Representation. Hojbjerg: Intervention Press.
Langton, M . ( 1993 ) Well, I Heard it on the Radio and I Saw it on the Television. Sydney: Aus
tralian Film Commission, p.72.
From Michaels, E . (1986) The Aboriginal Invention of Television. Canberra: Australian Insti
tute of Aboriginal Studies, Institute report. Cited by J. Ruby (1990) "The Belly of the Beast:
Eric Michaels and the Anthropology of Visual Communication". In Continuum: Commu
nication and Tradition - Essays after Eric Michaels. A n Australian Journal of the Media, 3,
p.39. See also Michaels, E . in the same issue pp. 8 - 31: " A Model of Teleported Texts" (with
reference to Aboriginal television).
Langton, M . ( 1993) Op.cit. - drawing on Michaels' ethnographic accounts.
91ibid.,p.78.
9 2 ibid., pp.78-79.
9 3 ibid., p.80.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 99
control to Indigenous groups. They might in fact be
seen as demonstrating only that Aboriginals are capable
of sophisticated productions of a particular kind. W h a t
m u s e u m s do might still be claimed as open only to peo
ple with different kinds of expertise.
T w o qualifiers to any blanket argument of this
kind are worth noting. O n e is that what is displayed in
m u s e u m s is n o w becoming more diverse. As m u s e u m s
become more accepting, for example, of video-based
installations, Indigenous productions can more read
ily be seen as ' m u s e u m material'. The other is that the
world of m u s e u m s n o w covers 'regional' as well as 'cen
tral' m u s e u m s , and 'regional' m u s e u m s m a y well offer
more space for local control over collection, display, and
decision-making.
N o m u s e u m , it is true, can operate in a fashion inde
pendent of some financial, technical, or advisory sup
port: needs that limit the extent to which any local
community can establish 'a m u s e u m of one's o w n ' .
Worth noting in the Australian setting, however, will be
the m o v e toward the development of "Keeping Places":
local sites where objects, designs and narratives of par
ticular significance to an area or group can be displayed,
maintained, and interpreted by local people for local
and potentially non-local audiences.94 These "Keeping
Places" need support and advice from central m u s e u m s
but they are one kind of step toward local control.
Worth noting in advance at this point also - to step
outside the Australian setting - is Cape Town's success
ful District Six M u s e u m (described in Chapter 5). It is a
local m u s e u m in the sense that it celebrates a particular
site of dispossession and survival. It is also independ
ent in the sense that it began without State financing,
starting instead with a church-volunteered building
and the volunteered labour of m a n y people. Several
of these brought in the experience of working in other
m u s e u m s , and funding n o w comes from m a n y sources,
including the South African government. The initiative
and the control, however, were local. There is no i m m e
diate parallel in the Australian setting, but its possible
occurrence underlines the question: Under what cir
cumstances does this kind of participation and involve
ment come to occur?
Corrective Images: Learning From
Other Media
U p to this point, I have been using events in other media
- film and television - as a base for considering aspects
of participation or consultation in relation to the process
of production and reviewing. Radio, film and television,
however, have long raised questions about the content
of the images presented. A highly favoured concern at
one time, for instance, was the number of times that peo
ple in a particular group - from 'blacks' to ' w o m e n ' , peo
ple with disabilities, or people in various ethnic groups
- appeared at all or appeared in anything other than stere
otyped roles.
With an increase in visibility, however, has come a
later concern: the presence and impact of what might be
called 'corrective images'. N o w , for example, Aborigines
appear in settings such as the Australian M u s e u m as
'nicer' and 'more thoughtful' than m a n y visitors expect:
as spiritual, respectful of family and the land, dealt with
unjustly but surviving and struggling to present their
history and m a k e their presence visible.
From film especially, however, come reminders that
'corrective images' can have their dangerous side. The
cautions are several:
• Emphasising one quality m a y imply the absence of
others. Hodge, for example, expresses a concern that
emphasising the importance to Aboriginals of events
that occurred in the Dreamtime m a y be interpreted
as implying that Aboriginals have a reduced sense of
reality, with non-Aboriginals forgetting the extent to
which - within their o w n cultures -creationist beliefs
of a transcendent nature can live side-by-side with a
'reality orientation'.95
• Stories or images that, in their wish to demonstrate
that Indigenous peoples are 'just like us' rather than
'alien' to us, m a y end up implying that there are no
differences between Indigenous or non-Indigenous.
The sense of difference, however - both from non-
Indigenous and amongst themselves - m a y be what
Indigenous groups value.96
• Emphasising the extent to which Indigenous and non-
Indigenous groups 'understand one another' m a y limit
our awareness of several intersubjectivities. It also
100 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
implies that there is only one form of intersubjectivity
involved. Langton offers a more complex view:
"Both Aboriginal and Non-Aboriginal people create
'Aboriginalities' so that ... there might be said to be
three kinds of subjectivity. The first is the experi
ence of the Aboriginal person interacting with other
Aboriginal people . . . . The second is the stereotyping,
iconicising and mythologising . . . by white people
w h o have never had any substantial first-hand contact
with Aboriginal people. The third is the construction
generated w h e n Aboriginal and Non-Aboriginal peo
ple engage in mutual dialogue, where the individuals
test and adapt imagined models of each other to find
satisfying models of mutual comprehension".97
All three forms seem likely to be involved in the devel
opment of community participation or shared forms of
understanding and practice. N o w w e need to learn h o w
all three forms come into play with one another. Film
especially yields two pieces of cautionary advice that
museums m a y well note. O n e of these takes the form:
'Nice' images of the other may hold back understanding.
They m a y in fact produce a swing back of the pendu
lum when inevitable cracks appear in the 'nice' picture.
In Langton's words: "the reversal of assumptions using a
positive/negative cultural formula ... does not challenge
racism".98 In Wallace's, "so-called 'negative images' will
probably be necessary to any kind of reformulation or
restructuring of prevailing conceptions of 'race' and 'eth
nicity' "."
The other cautionary note takes the form: Putting
out only positive 'corrective' images can create difficul
ties when w e need to add shadings, or be more multi
dimensional in presentation. Langton's comments on
this score are m a d e with reference to representations of
heavy Aboriginal drinking in a film m a d e with a large
Aboriginal cast (This is Back-Roads, directed by Phil
Noyce and including actors Gary Foley, Bill Hunter,
and Essie Coffey). Her comments are, however, equally
applicable to any representation where people are pre
sented in the single form of peacefully mild people, vic
tims of injustice, or resistant heroes.
Moving Forward
This chapter marks the second of a pair devoted to muse
u m s that contain both a natural history emphasis and a
strong section detailing aspects of Indigenous life and
culture. That mixed content in itself predisposes muse
u m s of this type toward some particular forms of chal
lenge and change. Here, for example, w e are most likely
to see forms of challenge and change related to divisions
between 'the natural' and 'the cultural', the relegation of
'first peoples' to an irrelevant past and a lesser status on
some implied evolutionary line, and the rights of muse
u m s - by virtue of the expertise their staff possess and
the fading interests of Indigenous groups - to collect and
hold what 'science' needs.
The pair of chapters that follows turns to m u s e u m s
of a different type. These m u s e u m s are not part of 'sci
ence'. They do, however, present history. They also do
so in particular ways. N o w the physical structures in
themselves - the sites or the buildings - embody history,
convey particular versions of it, mark what is regarded
as significant, and construct memory . These are muse
u m s of the type k n o w n as 'historic sites'. W e m a y expect
them to confirm some of the forms of challenge and
change that have already appeared. W e m a y also expect
them to bring out further aspects to challenge and
change and to highlight additional issues relevant to all
m u s e u m s .
Keeping Culture: Achieving Self-determination Through the Development of Aboriginal Cul
tural Centres and Keeping Places. Op.cit.
15 Hodge, R. (1990) Op.cit, p. 218.
16 See Langton, M . ( 1993) Op.cit, pp 28-29.
' ' ibid, p.81.
18 ibid., p.43.
The comment by Wallace is from Wallace, M . ( 1990) Invisibility Blues: From Pop to Theory.
London: Verso. Cited by Langton, M . ( 1993) Op.cit., p. 56.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 101
CHAPTER 5
Historic Sites:
Cape T o w n
CH A P T E R S 3 A N D 4 dealt with the type of m u s
e u m that most people think of first when the word -
m u s e u m - is mentioned. Those are museums with a
strong emphasis on natural history, mixed with some of
the history of people.
Chapters 5 and 6 take up m u s e u m s of a further type.
These are historic sites. W h y consider any type other
than the first? A n d w h y these?
A general reason for going beyond the first type of
m u s e u m was noted briefly in Chapter 1 and at the end
of Chapter 4. Each n e w type of m u s e u m brings out n e w
aspects of challenge and change, extending both our
understanding and the range of possibilities that might
be considered by all m u s e u m s .
More specific to historic sites is the way these sites
and the buildings on them embody history and rela
tionships among various groups. The land they occupy,
the bricks and mortar they are made of - these carry
the stories of first encounters, first governance, set
tlement, and continuing dispossession. The stories
presented m a y n o w seem all the more real and all the
more difficult to challenge or undo. Here surely are the
tangible signs of history 'as it was'.
More specific to historic sites also are some partic
ular aspects of change. Historic sites present decisions
and possibilities that go beyond those w e have seen in
relation to natural history m u s e u m s . If a building, for
example, presents a false history, what might be done?
Should w e tear it d o w n in Berlin-wall style? Should w e
save it, or part of it, as a reminder of what was? Should
we modify it or use it for a different purpose? If a build
ing, as it stands, is n o w dilapidated or extensively ren
ovated, should it be left 'as found' or restored? Should
pieces be brought in to show what was 'typical' of the
time? Does that m e a n that the place is then no longer
'authentic'? Does the house or the site tell a complete
story or should the viewer's attention be drawn to what
or w h o is omitted? W h a t social or political message
does any preservation convey?
Similar decisions m a y be faced by m u s e u m s of other
kinds. Should the Bushman diorama in Cape Town's
South African M u s e u m , for example, be closed indefi
nitely ("archived"), taken apart and removed from the
m u s e u m , or re-presented with an explanatory note
showing h o w it belongs to a past view of the world and
with counter-images that present a current view of the
past and the present? M u s e u m s of the type k n o w n as
historic sites or historic m u s e u m s give such decisions
particular prominence and a more detailed form.
Those general features of historic sites have guided
the choice of particular places to consider for Cape
T o w n and Sydney. For Cape T o w n (Chapter 5), I have
chosen more than one place, each raising different
issues: essentially, different ways of undoing the nar
ratives they presented. For Sydney, I have chosen one
place only: a place that raises decisions not covered by
the Cape T o w n choices. Here there is no longer a house.
Discovered, however, is the site of the First Governor's
102 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
House: a site for 'first encounters' and 'first governance'.
W h a t steps should then be taken with the site? W h a t
shaped the decisions that were made and continue to be
made?
The opening section describes two places that are
sites for colonial narratives. These are the homestead
k n o w n as Groot Constantia, and the urban house
k n o w n as the Bo-Kaap M u s e u m (the "Malay" M u s e u m ) .
The first tells a simplified story of colonial glory and
enterprising settlement, with the colonised made invis
ible. The second acknowledges the presence of others
and imposes distinctions a m o n g them: distinctions,
however, of the colonisers' o w n making.
The chapter then considers three possible ways of
undoing the narratives that historic sites often present.
These could apply within any setting but are taken up
here with Cape T o w n as a specific case. O n e is by work
ing within these m u s e u m s but adding some modifica
tions to the narratives. Steps in this direction are out
lined for both Constantia and Bo-Kaap.
A second way forward is by presenting alternative
narratives in other buildings: buildings that cover similar
or larger periods of time and that in themselves carry
a great deal of symbolic power. In the Cape T o w n case,
these buildings are The Slave Lodge and The Castle.
Steps in this direction provide the body of the chapter's
Section B .
A third way forward is by having a site, rather than a
building, carry the meaning. In the Cape T o w n case, this
is The District Six M u s e u m . The site is a church in the
area from which people were dispossessed. The church
building in itself carries less history. Into that shell,
however, people pour their history. They trace out the
streets that were once the paths of their lives. They write
or 'inscribe' their histories, without interpretation from
others and in ways that bring out the pain of disposses
sion, the survival of their spirit, and the need for a criti
cal eye when faced with one-dimensional accounts of
any people or any event.
To the third alternative I give the major space (Sec
tions C and D ) . That is in part because it captures some
provocative changes in approach to the functions of
a m u s e u m and in part because it is accompanied by
some unusually explicit statements about theory and its
translation into practice. It is also because the District
Six M u s e u m provides some interesting parallels to the
M u s e u m of Sydney described in Chapter 6: a m u s e u m
erected "on the site of the First Governor's House" but
not aimed at any direct restoration or reconstruction in
a physical sense.The final section of the chapter again
follows the pattern of earlier chapters. It singles out a
particular topic, highlighted by the specific muse
u m s considered but relevant to issues of challenge and
change in all m u s e u m s . For this chapter, that topic is
the nature of conceptual positions and the translation
of concepts into position. The conceptual positions
considered are those that are particularly explicit in
accounts of the District Six M u s e u m . They have to do
with the place of narrative and the nature of m e m o r y .
For some readers one site missing is that of Robben
Island. As mentioned in previous chapters, however,
this site has been extensively discussed elsewhere while
other sites and their meanings have been less explored.
I have therefore chosen to explore these lesser k n o w n
examples.
Given the several m u s e u m s considered in this chap
ter, the sources of material are noted with the introduc
tion of each m u s e u m . They are, however, again a mix
ture of observations at the time of visiting, text material,
and comments at interview.
A. Sites For Colonial Narratives:
Groot Constantia A n d Bo-kaap
Both of these historic sites are part of the Iziko group of
museums . Both are examples of constructed narratives,
seen n o w as strangely at odds with 'the past as it really
was'. Both raise interesting questions about h o w particu
lar images and narratives are constructed and presented,
about what they highlight and what they exclude. At a
time w h e n strategic choices needed to be m a d e a m o n g
the m a n y actions to be taken in relation to Cape Town's
museums , neither was targeted for major change in the
buildings themselves. Both then raise the question: W h a t
are the alternatives?
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 103
Groot Constantia
Groot Constantia1 is the kind of site and house that car
ries narratives of colonial glory and 'settlement'. It is pre
sented as 'old', is elegantly furnished, features a large wine
cellar, is surrounded by rich land, and is accompanied by
a text that concentrates on its owners, their famous visi
tors, and the prizes w o n by the wines that the farm pro
duced. Overall, it offers a story of Dutch and Afrikaner
continuity, of a pioneering use of land, and of interna
tional recognition. To the critical viewer, it presents also
a story of history that begins only with European o w n
ership and cultivation, of exclusion by invisibility (the
farm's slaves and labourers are minimal characters in
the narrative), a special variety of'tolerance' with regard
to colour, and the presence of government control and
support behind the surface story of entrepreneurial pio
neers.
For material, I draw mainly on three sources: direct
observations in the course of a guided tour2, an on-line
description3, and a 1997 history written by Matthjis van
der M e r w e and published by the South African Cultural
History M u s e u m . 4
Constantia as a house
Van der Merwe's account starts with a description of the
house as "the finest surviving example of Cape Dutch
architecture".5 O n e might then interpret the house and
its furnishings as continuations of what once was there.
In fact, however, the homestead on display was "struc
turally changed" in the late 1700's, "adding magnificence
and comfort".6 It was also largely destroyed by a fire in
1925. Restored in 1926, it was opened as a m u s e u m in 1927,
with the furniture in it being either donated or bought
for the purpose by "the art collector A . A . de Pass. To this
day, the de Pass collection still forms the nucleus of the
exhibition in the manor house".7
Constantia and early governance
The account by Van der M e r w e begins in 1679. In that
year, Simon van der Stel arrived from the Netherlands in
Cape T o w n to take up a position as C o m m a n d e r of Cape
T o w n (a position later converted to Governor). Control
of the Cape at that time was in the hands of the Dutch
East India Company, and Van der Stel's appointment was
made by the C o m p a n y (his father had also worked for
the company, predominantly in what was then - and is
still in Van der Merwe's account - "Batavia"). The fami
ly's first h o m e was in the Castle: the town's garrison. Van
der Stel, however, w h o had owned two vineyards in the
Netherlands, quickly began looking for land suitable for
viticulture. In 1685, he was granted title, by the Dutch
East India Company , to an area of approximately 2500
hectares, situated behind Table Mountain. H e remained
Governor until his retirement in 1699 but building at
Constantia began in 1685.
In V a n der Merwe's account, no reference is m a d e to
the land's earlier occupants, its earlier use or, for that
matter, the presence of other settlers in the area. Van
der M e r w e notes, however, the still larger vineyards of
Van der Stel's two sons on neighbouring land, the forced
acquisition of an adjoining farm while V a n der Stel was
still Governor (1693), and one expression of concern
about the extent to which his involvement in farming
left time and energy for his duties as Governor.8
Incorporation into colonial history
The record offered both by Van der M e r w e and by Iziko's
briefer on-line account is one that emphasises succeed
ing families (one family - the Cloete family - is noted as
holding the property from 1778 to 1885). The degree of
control that ownership allowed, however, was far from
complete. As late as 1780, wine grown at Constantia (and
the Cape in general) had to be sold to the Dutch East
India Company . As late as 1779, Hendrik Cloete was pro
testing against the Company's embargo on "the export of
wine . . . as gifts to individuals in the Netherlands" and,
for enterprises such as Constantia, was arguing for "the
right ... to sail and trade with their o w n ships".9 A more
flexible agreement was reached in 1793, but free enter
prise was clipped again with the British occupation of
the Cape in 1795. The British Governor n o w took control.
"In effect, only the n a m e of the Constantia wine m o n o p
olist had changed".10
A governing hand re-emerged even more strongly in
1885 w h e n the property came up for auction. This was
after a time w h e n first mildew and then phylloxera had
104 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
attacked the vines and after the return of the patri
arch of the family - Henry Cloete - from a period in
France. The farm was bought by the government and
used mainly as an experimental vineyard, with primary
responsibility resting with the Department of Agricul
ture. The house became in 1969 the responsibility of the
South African Cultural History M u s e u m (the M u s e u m
that had split off from the South African M u s e u m
in 1964 and was intended to give more prominence to
Afrikaner history and lines of succession from Europe,
bypassing other African history). The Cultural History
M u s e u m became responsible for the homestead and the
wine cellar. "In 1971, it established the W i n e M u s e u m in
a part of the wine cellar",11 and in 1997 sponsored V a n
der Merwe's 64-page historical account.
Exclusion by invisibility
As noted earlier, the historical accounts of Constantia
contain no mention of previous ownership or use of the
land before Van der Stel was granted title. The one refer
ence to the people already present is framed in terms of
Van der Stel's unappreciated generosity:
"The G e r m a n traveller Pieter Kolb claimed that
Van der Stel adopted a young boy n a m e d Pengu of
Khoikhoi descent, w h o m he reared as a Christian
and later sent to India in service of the Commissioner
General of the V O C . However, Kolb reported, Pengu
eventually came back to the Cape, rejoined his family,
shed his European clothes, returned to the Khoikhoi
m o d e of life and was never again seen by white resi
dents".12
Other sources of possible labour receive more attention,
but the references are minimal. Until slavery was abol
ished in the Cape in 1834 (it was not allowed in the Neth
erlands), slaves provided essential labour. Their presence
is noted in inventories and in some of the observations
by guests (e.g. 15 slaves offering a morning serenade to
Hendrik Cloete).13 Within the description of the house,
and within the guided tour for this visitor, however, the
housing offered to slaves receives little mention. Van der
M e r w e notes that "it is not clear where the Constan
tia slaves were housed"14 and the tour guide mentioned
slaves only in response to a direct question. Nor is it clear,
for the labourers w h o came in after slavery was abolished
in 1834, where they came from or were housed.
A special case of colour
O n e of the odd features to the official account is the early
and prominent mention of Van der Stel as a "mestizo":
"According to official documents, incidentally, Simon
was a mestizo, or half-blood, his maternal grandmother
being of mixed descent".15
In a country renowned for its concern with skin
colour, w h y start with this reminder that the m a n w h o
was both the first Governor and a major pioneer was
of "mixed descent"? A n d w h y give prominent space -
together with a painting - to the wife of a later owner (a
w o m a n w h o as a w i d o w then became herself the owner
of Constantia) as being from a slave background?
"Anna de Koningh was born in Batavia, one of three
children of the slave k n o w n as Angela of Bengal.
The whole family was brought to the Cape by Pieter
K e m p , a Free Burgher of Batavia, w h o sold them to
Jan van Riebeeck . . . . Thus it was that a former sol
dier w h o had spent a term in prison (for taking part
in the looting of a ship that had run aground) and his
wife, A n n a de Koningh, the child of Batavian slaves,
became owners of Groot Constantia".16
T h e term Groot Constantia refers to there having once been two farms: Groot and Klein
Constantia. I shall use the single term "Constantia" to refer to the homestead and the farm
as it eurrendy exists.
" T h e tour was held in N o v e m b e r 2001. For recent changes see the epilogue in this vo lume.
Iziko online: www.museums.org.zj /grootcon/index.html 4
V a n der M e r w e , M . (1997) Groot Constantia 1685-1885: Its Owners and Occupants. C a p e
T o w n : South African Cultural History M u s e u m .
ibid.,p.3.
6 ibid., p.32.
Iziko online: www.museums.org.za/grootcon/ index.html
8 V a n der M e r w e , M . (1997) Op.cit.,p.l3.
9 ibid., p .38.
10ibid.,p.38.
11 u-j ibid., p .7 .
12
ibid., p. 15. T h e V O C is the contracted form, in Dutch, for the Dutch East India C o m p a n y .
1 3 ibid., p .38.
14ibid.,p.l5.
15ibid.,p.9.
16ibid.,p.l8.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 105
The most likely explanation seems to be that the 'mixture'
here contains no 'African' blood and is part of grand
Dutch colonial history. The background is all 'Batavia'.
(Simon van der Stel's father had, as noted earlier, worked
for the Dutch East India C o m p a n y in Batavia and his
maternal grandmother presumably came from that
area). Empire and 'the East', it appears, over-ride colour
(a way of thinking that reappears in the Bo-Kaap 'Malay'
M u s e u m ) . The bar is Indigenous descent.
Possible on-site changes
Given the incorporation of the Cultural History M u s e u m
into the overall Iziko structure, the future of Constan-
tia and it's somewhat one-sided are n o w up for review
with it's somewhat one-sided history. (For an update on
this review and initial changes see the epilogue in this
volume by the current C E O of Iziko, Jatti Bredekamp.)
Few narratives of the slaves and others working on the
farm were included in the story presented in 2001. Part
of the review includes questions of funding. Those, h o w
ever, were on the table earlier in the 1990's. As Van der
M e r w e notes, Constantia had been relying since 1855
"on state funding for its survival", a "state of affairs" that
"was brought to a head when major political, economic
and social changes were taking place and appeals to gov
ernment were increasing tenfold."17 Fiscal responsibility
was accordingly assigned to a newly formed Trust in 1993,
with the aim of having the estate be more "commercially
run".
Changes more specific to the heritage narrative are
likely to be closer to Iziko planning. O n e minimal pos
sibility consists of making available to visitors an alter
native history. That could be drawn, for example, from
the 'timeline' produced by Ciraj Rassool and Tos Thorne
for a book about the District Six M u s e u m and designed
"to go beyond narrow celebratory frameworks".18
In this time-line, for instance, are to be found refer
ences to the "Peninsular Khoekhoe" as holding in 1650
"a monopoly on trade with the Dutch" (Cape T o w n
was at the time a garrison and re-supply spot for ves
sels on the way to the Dutch East Indies), to the arrival
in 1657 of slaves from Angola and West Africa, to raids
on herds of Dutch settlers (1659), to an abortive slave
uprising at Stellenbosch (1690), to an expansion of
sources for slaves (especially Madagascar: 1700's), to a
smallpox epidemic that decimated the Khoekhoe popu
lation of the south-western Cape (1713), and to "the last
armed resistance by Khoesan in south-western Cape"
(i739)-
Here also, to take some slightly later dates, are notes
on Britain as banning slave trading and so undoing the
legal bringing of slaves to the Cape (1807), of the need
for emancipated slaves to find n e w housing (1830's -
1840's), and of the continued arrival of slaves (around
3000 "Prize Negroes") on illegal slave ships (1840 -1856).
Providing an alternative written time-line, however,
is likely to be regarded by m a n y as an insufficient form
of change. Equally inadequate, Patricia Davison c o m
ments, would be the addition of some 'workers' cottages'
to remedy the current invisibility of all but the owners'
families. Larger changes, however, m a y also have rela
tively little appeal at the m o m e n t . The critical issue m a y
be one of audiences. To foreign visitors interested in an
unexamined colonial history, and m a n y Afrikaners, the
site is still attractive. For some also, an emphasis on the
vineyards and the wine cellar might be more appeal
ing than any expanded or questioning account of social
history. In its current state, however, the non-inclusive
history is certainly not appropriate for visiting school
groups (there are n o w few of these). The number of
unthinking foreign tourists m a y also be declining, with
a rising interest in seeing 'the other side of Africa'. Not
surprisingly, then, Patricia Davison comments, change
at Constantia is for the m o m e n t taking second place
to changes elsewhere, notably in places where the site
lends itself more easily to a more inclusive history and
where visitors are more likely to be sizeable. These are
The Slave Lodge and The Castle described in Section B .
The Bo-Kaap Museum
This small m u s e u m derives its n a m e from the area in
which it is situated (the Bo-Kaap). Its interest stems from
the ways in which it came to be presented as a 'Malay'
m u s e u m , its dubious status as a 'period house' and as
representative of a community, and the possible direc
tion of change towards its becoming "a community-ori
ented social history museum".1 9
The material drawn upon consists primarily of direct
106 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION * MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
observation, a brief on-line description that appears to
be out-of-date20, and an unpublished paper generously
provided by Nazeem Lowe, appointed as Curator in
1997. That paper is especially oriented toward the need
and the possibilities for change. In Lowe's words:
"As a serious attempt at a period house m u s e u m " - the
m u s e u m is supposedly 'typical' of a mid-19 th century
Muslim h o m e in Cape T o w n - "the Bo-Kaap M u s e u m
was a failure since inception. As an apartheid project
to create a spurious 'Malay identity' in an equally
spurious 'Malay Quarter' it was quite a success".21
T h e area as a constructed quarter
To quote Lowe again, "the majority of householders in
the area at the time were white workers and traders".22
"Nothing in the display", however, "indicates that the area
was . . . racially and ethnically mixed . . . Christian, Hindu,
and all non-Malay ethnic and religious identities have
been purposely 'cleansed' from the museum's displays".23
T h e m u s e u m as a constructed period house
The Iziko on-line description presents the building as
"a rare example of early urban Cape Dutch architecture
from the mid-eighteenth century".24 At the m o m e n t ,
it consists of a set of four rooms opening from a large
stoep, a large courtyard with its o w n entrance, and
- beyond the courtyard - an equally large annex: also
with its o w n entrance. (The annex is large enough to
have held "carts and carriages" from Constantia while
it was being renovated). In reality, Lowe comments, the
house as presented is misleading. It is "too spacious to
be typical . . . . The rooms are filled with the wrong kind
of objects ... most of the objects (were) from later peri
ods", none of the photographs displayed "belong to the
period at all" and "a number were . . . doctored to look
more authentic".25
Beginnings and governance
The house, along with most of the area, was slated for
demolition as part of 'urban development'. Its being
saved stemmed from several circumstances: the result
of a Group for the Preservation of the Malay Quarter,
formed in 1943, "the advent of the National Party gov
ernment in 1948, and the Group Areas Act in 1958" 26 (a
proclamation declaring the area as essentially ethni
cally 'pure' and 'Malay'). The policy of demolition then
became one of selective restoration and the house that is
n o w the m u s e u m was one of those selected.
The leading figure in the promotion of a "Malay
Quarter" and a "Malay M u s e u m " was an Orientalist,
Dr. I.D. du Plessis. In his view:
" A central building as a cultural centre, and a Malay
M u s e u m to house fast disappearing objects of histor
ical interest, would focus public attention not only on
the Quarter, but also on Cape T o w n as a city in which
the intermingling of East and West can be studied at
close range".27
In effect, some 'black' representation could occur within
the history presented for the Cape, but the people repre
sented would not be indigenous to the area or to Africa.
The social division was not simply between 'black' and
'white'. The period for the chosen house (the mid 1800's),
Lowe notes, was also one that was after slavery had been
abolished (1834), so that slave history (the starting point
for m a n y of the 'Malays') was also not part of the narra
tive.
ibid.,p.61.
Rassool, C . and T h o m e J. (2001 ) " A Timeline for District Six: A Parallel Text." In Rassool, C .
and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001 ) Recalling Community in Cape Town. Cape Town: District
Six Museum. T h e timeline runs from 1488 to 2000. T h e references to ''first people" or "first
encounters" are o n pp . 96-97.
19
L o w e , N . (2001) A Potted History of the Bo-Kaap Museum. Unpublished paper by the Cura
tor at the time. 7 0
www.museums.org .za /bokaap/ index .h tml This description, accessed in August 2002, refers
to the "collection of cart and carriages" that have since gone back to Groot Constantia and
to the use of the centre as a place for the B o - K a a p residents to "meet and host their o w n
exhibitions about the Mus l im culture".
L o w e , N . (2001) Op.cft., p .2 . L o w e uses here the term "Capetonian Mus l ims" and notes that
"Cape Mus l im" is the term preferred by local Musl ims to the term C a p e Malay. That latter
term is based only o n a language - Malay - spoken primarily as a trading language across an
area covering Malaysia and the old Dutch East Indies. 2 7
" ibid., p .2 . 23
ibid., p.3. 24
w w w . m u s e u m s . o r g . z a .
ibid., pp.2-3.
2 6 L o w e , N . (2001) Op.cit .p.l .
ibid., p. 1 T h e question is from a 1953 publication by d u Plessis.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 107
Incorporation into colonial history
The house became a satellite m u s e u m for the Cultural
History M u s e u m in 1978 (du Plessis was a board m e m b e r
of the Cultural History M u s e u m from 1967 until his death
in r98r, and had prompted in earlier years a "Malay dis
play" within the Cultural History M u s e u m ) . The objec
tive was to display "Cape Malay" culture, in the form of
an "artisan's h o m e " but with objects donated by others,
including du Plessis. In Lowe's view, the Cultural His
tory M u s e u m did little to promote the m u s e u m . It had
in fact "a history of arrogant and acrimonious dealings
with neighbouring residents and local tour guides" that
contributed further to "the lack of interaction between
the . . . M u s e u m and the community".28
A special case of colour
W h y should a government dedicated to apartheid be pre
pared to make room, even to create space and identity,
for a group that is not white? The answer, Lowe suggests,
lies in du Plessis' interest in the theme of'East meets West'
(the grand colonial Empire again). The "Malays" m a y
have been slaves or the descendants of slaves but they
were part of "the empire". The partitioning also served
the purpose of dividing the non-white population into
more manageable groups.
On-site change and plans for change
Change should become a possibility n o w that both the
Bo-Kaap M u s e u m and the Cultural History M u s e u m
have become incorporated into the overall structure of
Iziko. The question is one of h o w changes could meet
the clear government call for 'transformation', 'represent
ativeness', and self-funding.
The first step, L o w e comments , is a critical look
at the m u s e u m and the recognition of the Bo-Kaap
M u s e u m as a construction that is politically based. The
display has been - in Lowe's word - "cleansed". The
action called for then consists of seeing the m u s e u m as
part of a larger vision, restoring the excluded narratives:
"The development of the Bo-Kaap M u s e u m is con
ceived as a post-apartheid reconstructive act. In the
108 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N
great majority of South African m u s e u m s , the social
history of Cape T o w n , of blacks, and of labouring
classes have been deliberately excluded from view.
The political histories of slavery, colonialism and
apartheid are equally invisible. If older m u s e u m s are
not ... redeveloped to restore these narratives, they
have no reason or right to exist in a newly democratic
country".29
A second step is to link the m u s e u m more closely to the
community as it currently exists. Here, Lowe noted in
interview, was "a community m u s e u m out of step with
its community"30 and one in which the local community
took little interest.
Concretely, increased participation began w h e n the
annex was improved in 1999, ceasing to be a " d u m p
ing ground" for Constantia's carts and carriages. It was
then:
"re-shaped ... into a flexible, multi-functional gallery
and exhibition space, which is also used for educa
tion purposes, communi ty functions and meetings
M o r e documentary filming and news broadcasts
were hosted between 1998 and 2000 than in all the
previous years of the m u s e u m ' s existence. More
schools were hosted than before. M o r e individual
donations have been received and more corporate
funds raised than before. Most important, as m a n y as
5000 residents and ex-residents w h o never before had
any interest in the m u s e u m attended functions in the
annexe . . . . W e are witnessing the very beginning of
the building of a museum-going culture a m o n g black
Capetonians".31
C o m m u n i t y use would be further assisted by the inclu
sion of a kitchen in the annex with food from " c o m m u
nity-based providers". Further display changes would
also provide "a n e w m u s e u m experience". O n e room,
for example, would present the visitor with contrast
ing views of the Bo-Kaap community. Another would
maintain a display on "Islam and the Cape" but place it
amongst displays that would bring out "the main theme,
which is the social history of the Bo-Kaap".32
H o w far these changes will occur or be sustained
remains to be seen. There are some parties still inter-
D SYDNEY
ested in promoting the Bo-Kaap M u s e u m as a Muslim
m u s e u m and in highlighting a Muslim presence within
the Bo-Kaap area. These include tourist organisations
wishing to attract both foreign Muslim and n o n - M u s
lim visitors, and some community forces wishing
to maintain the 'integrity' of the area in the face of
encroaching central-city expansion. Separation rather
than inclusiveness still has its attractions.
B. Alternative Narratives In Other
Established Buildings
Highlighted in the previous section are some major gaps
and contradictions in the narratives presented by some
of Cape Town's historic houses. A number of these repeat
the difficulties noted for the South African M u s e u m
in Chapter 3: the implication of a smooth, 'mechani
cal' progression through time, the absence of significant
players, the casting of those w h o are there in a frozen or
one-dimensional light.
H o w is one to move toward a more complete history?
As in Sydney, Cape T o w n presents some particular chal
lenges on that score. O n e of these comes from the c o m
plexity of the story. In both cases, as I noted in Chapter 1,
these cities were not only sites of 'first encounters' with
Indigenous peoples. They were also, from early Euro
pean settlement, major ports: places into which people
came and went from m a n y countries. Cape T o w n has
as well been at the centre of several dramatic stories:
the displacement of its first people, a war between the
Dutch and the English, a slave history, 'Zulu wars', dis
possessions in the n a m e of 'urban renewal' and racially
demarcated areas, an often-deadly struggle against
apartheid, and n o w a political reversal. N o film studio
could hope for a richer or more sweeping narrative.
Are there places where at least some of that sweep
would be conveyed by the site or the building? T w o
possibilities are the buildings k n o w n as the Old Slave
Lodge and the Castle. Both, as Patricia Davison
describes, are currently Iziko's 'big priorities'.
The Slave Lodge
A serious problem in the Iziko group of museums , Patri
cia Davison underlines, is the general lack of attention to
slave history. There were in 2001 no spaces which dealt
with the issue of slavery in Cape T o w n , despite the enor
m o u s influence it had on the population.
O n e way to deal with this lack is to turn to a building
whose history is directly relevant. The most appropriate,
she continues, is the building n o w re-named "the Old
Slave Lodge". This building, one of the oldest in Cape
T o w n , was first used as housing for slaves held by the
Dutch East India Company . It could hold six hundred
slaves at a time, and was used as well to house "crimi
nals and the emotionally disturbed".33 The slaves were
moved to "a n e w lodge" in the Gardens in 1807 when
the British government took over the building as gov
ernment offices. After restoration in 1810, the building
housed a post office, a library, the Supreme Court and
then the South African Cultural History M u s e u m .
Patricia Davison describes some planned directions
of change:
" O n e of our big projects at the m o m e n t is to rede
velop the Slave Lodge It's a very symbolic site .. .
an important part of our history which hasn't been
really m a d e public ... w e would do it in a way that
also looks at the way that slaves have contributed to
our society. O n e floor would deal with the history
of slavery and also the resistance of slaves. There are
wonderful stories about slaves. In fact, I 'm just read
ing an Andre Brink novel ... Chain of Voices, which
is all about a slave rebellion. A lot of material is
available. W e have already on a database the names
of 3,000 slaves w h o were at the lodge. Over a period
of time there were probably about 9,000 altogether,
and at any one time there were between 500 and 800
slaves. They were the C o m p a n y slaves ... the East
India C o m p a n y slaves . . . . O f course, there were slave
lodges on farms and there were private slaves, but the
Lodge was for the C o m p a n y slaves
Lowe, N . (2001) Op.cit, p.4. >9
ibid., p.5.
Interview with Nazeem Lowe, November 2001.
)l Lowe, N . (2001 ) Op.cit., pp.5-6. P ~ ibid., p.7.
www.museums.org.za/slavelodge/index.html.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 109
We'll do slavery on the lower floor just because it
connects with the archaeology." (There are excava
tions in the courtyard). "Upstairs w e would do the
multicultural diversity of ... Cape T o w n society".
Right from the very beginning of the Colonial settle
ment, Patricia Davison continues, " w e were multilin
gual and multicultural".
Changes such as these would help accommodate a larger
part of Cape Town's history and the variety of back
grounds contributing to it. These ways of changing the
stories that old buildings tell, however, are mainly
still on the planning books. For some changes already
in place and a different set of circumstances contributing
to change, I turn to The Castle.
The Castle
Within Cape Town's historic sites, the Castle stands out
as offering a novel set of opportunities and constraints.
It has high symbolic value. In Lalou Meltzer's words,
"whatever one does in the Castle . . . has taken on a sym
bolic significance without really trying - it happens". It
offers an established narrative that might be both embel
lished and altered. It has potential audience appeal:
centrally placed, easy to get to, and capable of carrying
themes that would interest several audiences. It offers
also some physical room to move: a mixture of exist
ing pieces and of empty spaces, although with the con
straints of little funding. In terms of control, it offers as
well some administrative or negotiation room. The A r m y
has been nominally in charge. Its officers, however, have
no m u s e u m commitments or m u s e u m experience and
their responses have been predominantly post-hoc reac
tions to productions already made .
For sources on this m u s e u m , I draw from direct
observation, on-line material34, and interview c o m
ments fromLalou Meltzer and Patricia Davison.
Symbolic value and potential audience appeal
The Castle dates from 1666 though more recent additions
have been added. It housed Cape Town's military force,
and its Governor. Until the Slave Lodge was built, it also
housed slaves brought in by the Dutch East India C o m
pany. From the beginning, its meaning has been partly
military but also more than military:
"The Castle has traditionally been a symbol of White
South Africa. Let's just be blunt about that. The Castle
wasn't just a military headquarters in colonial times.
It was where the Governor lived. It was the Council
of Policy, the Court of Justice. It was where colonial
administration happened all throughout the Dutch
period and the early part of the English period until
1811. Really every aspect of the administration, poli
tics, justice occurred here, as well as the soldiers."35
That symbolic value continues through to recent times.
It was, for many, a 'no-go' area of such power that open
ing it up to a wider public, making it a space that invites
them in, would in itself have dramatic value:
"It was like no-man's land . . . . Right up until the
early 90's, black people, as a rule, never came here.
Particularly because under apartheid, and before, it
was army headquarters. You wouldn't want to come
to where the organs of repression were housed."
Even for whites, Lalou Meltzer continues, the Castle was
for m a n y "an unhappy place", particularly "in the 70's
and 8o's when there was an 'end-conscription' campaign
by white conscripts. The conflict around all of that actu
ally took place here."
A n end-of-apartheid story, however, is not the only
story that the Castle can tell. Into the history of the Cas
tle, one might weave the presence of m a n y of the Cape's
peoples:
"Khoi-San would come in here" (all 'first contacts'
went through the Castle). "Also, various people were
detained here. The Zulu King, Cetswayo, was impris
oned here so ... one could also show some of that."
In effect, the building with its several histories can
embody the broad sweep of the current city's back
ground.
110 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Physical r o o m to m o v e
Part of the Castle is well occupied. Apart from the space
taken up by the A r m y headquarters, there are also several
apartment areas that display early Cape furniture and
paintings. Given particular pride of place is the William
Fehr Collection, purchased by the State and presented to
the Castle as part of a Festival celebrating 300 years after
Van Riebeck's arrival at the Cape in 1652.
With the Army's beginning to phase d o w n its pres
ence at the Castle, however, there has been space to use,
a contrast to the frequent complaint in m u s e u m s of
needing new space to house even what they have:
"With these empty spaces . . . some of the original
ideas had been to furnish apartments in the i7Th,
18th and 19th century There were two reasons w h y
w e didn't go ahead with furnishing apartments, (a)
There are so m a n y of these domestic interiors in the
Cape ... Stephan Weltz, w h o runs Sotheby's in South
Africa, made this point at a meeting at the Cultural
History M u s e u m - 'If you're blindfolded and some
one took you to different country m u s e u m s and some
of the museums in Cape T o w n and you opened your
eyes, you wouldn't k n o w which m u s e u m you were in'.
So w e had enough of those interiors. A n d (b) thank
goodness, in a way, w e didn't have money any more
to begin to buy the furniture to do all of these things.
So w e had these spaces and one of the ways that w e
utilised them, and it was m y only achievement - m y
best achievement - is by using these spaces as tempo
rary exhibition centres and repositioning the Castle
in that way."
Administrative r o o m to m o v e
A constant theme in any production has to do with the
set of interested parties: with their agendas and with
their capacity to influence decisions. After her time at
the South African Cultural History M u s e u m , where
the Director and the trustees had very firm ideas as to
the kind of m u s e u m and the kinds of exhibitions they
wanted, Lalou Meltzer found that the A r m y allowed her
more scope. Contributing to that were several circum
stances:
• The Director of the M u s e u m was an A r m y Officer
with no m u s e u m experience. A year after Meltzer
moved to the Castle's m u s e u m section (1990), its then
Director died. Meltzer was appointed Acting Director,
until the appointment of a m a n w h o combined an
A r m y and a m u s e u m role:
"They appointed the Captain of the Castle, w h o had
absolutely no m u s e u m experience. It was a ceremo
nial role. (But) they appointed him Director of the
William Fehr Collection, and he remained so until
about two years ago."
The effect was that Meltzer could make decisions. As
she says with regard to possibly adding more furnished
apartments: "7 decided, because museologically I was
able to hold m y o w n with the new Director."
• The Army's attachment was more toward going
"with the Government" and officially "staying out of
politics" than with the production or maintenance
of a particular political position. To Lalou Meltzer's
annoyance, for example, she was told before the
elections to remove "political propaganda" from her
office: election posters and banners she had begun to
collect, including some with Nelson Mandela's face on
them. "Maybe four weeks after that, Nelson Mandela's
portrait was above the desk of every A r m y Officer."
• The A r m y was in the process of moving out, with
the expectation that eventually they would move out
completely: "they shut d o w n officially on 31 March this
year - 2001 - but they're still here in bits and pieces".
W h o s e space was whose, then, held some elements of
ambiguity.
Changes m a d e and planned
With the aim of using the history of the Castle as a base
for Cape Town's social history, one of the first steps was
the making of a video with the film-maker Cliff Bestal:
See: www.museums.org.za/wfc.htm.
Interview with Lalou Meltzer Nov. 2001.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "•> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 111
" w e told the story that began before 1652 .. . That there
were slaves . . . . All these stories that were hidden
came out for the first time in this video."
The video, however, had to be approved by the Director
and the Board of Trustees. They banned it, and the video
- made in 1992 - is n o w "a bit outdated". Something like
that, however, is still needed.
A series of temporary exhibitions met with more
success. A complete list of these is available on-line.361
focus, however, on those that Lalou Meltzer singles out
as memorable and on her accounts of w h y they were so.
"Wha t happened for the first exhibition .. . (was that)
the Muslim community ... came to us . . . and said: 'In
1994, w e want to celebrate the arrival of Sheik Yusuf
in 1694 .. . H e was exiled from the East to the Cape by
the Dutch East India C o m p a n y and he is regarded by
m a n y people as the founder of Islam in the Cape'
It wasn't a fundamentalist Muslim community that
came here. It was led by historians like Achmat Davis
.. . and they wanted to tell the story of Islam in the
Cape. A n d they wanted to do it at The Castle and not
at the Bo-Kaap ... it was part of this enthusiasm ...
building up towards the first elections and (the feel
ing that) everyone's history had a place in the sun.
For m e it was one of the nicest projects I've ever
worked on .. . one worked with the community and
because w e have no workshop staff, members of the
community helped us make the exhibition. It wasn't
a wonderful exhibition, but it was a community exhi
bition. It was timed to coincide with a bigger cel
ebration in Cape T o w n and the result was that peo
ple marched peacefully from District Six into town
... and they marched into The Castle peacefully and
into the exhibition.
O f course, the A r m y nearly hit the sky. They kept
running to m e and saying 'Wha t must w e do with
all these people?' I said 'Well nothing. They've come
to the exhibition' . . . . It was wonderful. People even
prayed at six o'clock. They turned to Mecca and they
prayed. There was food sold. W h a t w e also did our
selves, w e presented a small selection of artworks
from our collection on Islam and slavery. Not easy,
because m a n y people in the Muslim community don't
want to k n o w about slavery, so that was an issue. But
w e did it nevertheless because w e did it with the sup
port of the community. That was the first exhibition
... an absolute success in terms of attracting people
w h o had never been to The Castle."
That first exhibition set off a chain of other people
w h o approached the Castle with requests for use of the
space and offers of partnership and assistance. Meltzer
describes its appeal:
"It was a free space. It was a space that wasn't highly
curated. I just worked all the time in partnership with
everyone w h o came along and for m e it worked to de-
politicise the space. That worked because with each
exhibition one got another group of people interested
and involved. But it was also a product of not having
the infrastructure to be able to make our o w n exhibi
tions .. . I didn't have the practical wherewithal to do
our o w n exhibitions."
A m o n g the exhibitions that Meltzer notes as helping to
"depoliticise" and to attract people into the Castle were
these:
An exhibition from a museum in Amsterdam, Neder-
land - Tegen Apartheid - with "posters and memorabilia
of the apartheid era" (October 1994 - January 1995).
A second exhibition on apartheid - Setting Apart - in
partnership with the Mayibuye Centre, the District
Six M u s e u m , and the architect Hilton Judin, w h o had
developed an earlier exhibition in the Hague tracing
"the architecture rooted in the history of South Africa".
For the Castle exhibition, Judin "borrowed documents
from the Archives ... (and) built huge glass display
cases for them .. . just a few labels ... it was the docu
ments that spoke. A n d there were video monitors where
they had recorded stories by people from District Six
(and) from all over: stories of the dispossessed." (April
- M a y 1995)
An exhibition with the title - Scurvy - (June - July
!995) • "Scurvy was a disease that sailors got... so it was
really a reference to the colonial past." It stands out for
Lalou Meltzer for its involving a n e w partnership, and
another new audience. The partnership was n o w one
with the artist Kevin Brand:
112 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
"He 'd been to these other openings and he saw that
these same spaces could be very interesting for con
temporary art For the first time installations
were shown", installations that made good use of the
Castle's m a n y spaces: "old rooms ... basement areas
with stone floors .. . old ovens ... peeling paint."
The new audience was in this case not black but "a lot of
youthful, arty people, quite a lot of white youth . . . . Every
time the exhibition brought in a new kind of audience."
A further art exhibition in 1996: Fault Lines - Enquir
ies into Truth and Reconciliation. "I think one of the best
exhibitions was ... an art show curated by Jane Taylor"
in reaction to the Truth and Reconciliation inquiry. Jane
Taylor brought in "a number of artists like Jane Alex
ander and Moshekwa Langa and .. . Lynn Botha (the
daughter of Pik Botha, w h o was a minister from the old
regime w h o became quite liberal in the latter period) . . .
Lynn Botha did this installation of washing on the line
... She'd cut up cloth and printed various images on it...
hanging it on the line was hanging the dirty washing . . . .
W h e n I think about it (this exhibition), I get gooseflesh
because it was so powerful, every aspect of it."
Part of that exhibition also was the display of an
image of Hector Petersen, one of the first children to be
killed when students revolted in Soweto:
" A photograph of him being carried by another young
boy, a little girl at his side ... has become symbolic of
the student uprising of 1976. That image was taken by
Kevin (Brand) .. . he used black and grey bits of paper,
and large blocks of paper" (a photograph shows the
work as the height of the outside wall of the Castle).37
"I don't k n o w h o w w e did it, but w e managed to put it
on the outside wall of the Castle under all the flags"
(It m a y have helped that "you could only see the
image at a distance").
"After that w e were told never would w e able to do
any art exhibition except within our o w n rooms/
areas. Because I can tell you that must have punched
every old White officer right in the stomach when
they came in. The A r m y said from that point on,
strictly every outside area is theirs and w e are not
allowed to work in that area."
W h a t then is the future for exhibitions at the Castle?
Lalou Meltzer sees it as n o w established as a meeting
space, with changing audiences:
"The Castle has become very open .. . m a n y compa
nies hold their functions here. There are carnivals.
There are gourmet food fairs .. . even given the politi
cal times w e live in, people aren't so interested in that
history any more. In fact there's a kind of wish to just
forget about it and move forward, The Castle always
seems to m e to represent the history of the time."
The future will also continue to hold the hope of "a per
manent exhibition which would have to address The
Castle's o w n history as a start." That will depend, h o w
ever, on h o w her space and administrative structures
develop:
"The future at the m o m e n t . . . is that the Castle should,
as a whole, come under the Department of Arts and
Culture and really from that point on we'll have to
work out the spaces that we'll have to do these tem
porary exhibitions."
Change might take a very different form for museums
that are outside government control. For that possibility,
I turn to the District Six M u s e u m .
C. Developing A N e w Site:
The District Six Museum
W h a t makes this m u s e u m interesting, especially as an
'historic site' museum? 3 8 Noteworthy as a start are its
physical base, its history and timing, its intended func
tions, and the relatively explicit concepts that have
shaped both its emerging at all and its continuing form.
The m u s e u m itself is centrally located, although it
is n o w included as part of an obligatory first stop on
tours that offer a visit to 'the other side of Africa' and
that proceed to the townships surrounding the city. The
www.museums.org.za/wfc/spec_exh.htm.
The art work can be seen at: www.museums.org.za/wfc/spec_/exh.htm.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 113
building is a church still standing in the area k n o w n
as District Six. That area was largely demolished over a
period of almost two decades, with the major destruc
tion occurring in the early 1980's. Left are its churches
and mosques and some refurbished housing given
over to Afrikaans-speaking whites in the 1980's. All
told, 60 000 people were moved out, after the area was
declared in 1966 as in need of "slum clearance" and
designated a "White group area". Largely as a result of
protests against "redevelopment", 35% of the land still
remains vacant. Here then is a building with no long
history of significance in itself but with recent symbolic
value as part of a place of destruction, dispossession,
loss, and survival.
In terms of time, the m u s e u m itself is new. A brief
preliminary exhibition opened in November 1992. The
official opening was in December 1994, with an exhibi
tion (Streets: Retracing the District) that was meant to
last for two weeks and ran for four years. The planning
and the opening then were at a time of major political
changes in South Africa and, internationally, of changes
in concepts of history and of the shape and functions of
museums .
Diversity marks the museum's intended functions.
Across the m a n y aims expressed by the wide-rang
ing group that worked to establish a m u s e u m and, as
a group, to shape its form, however, there are some
c o m m o n threads. The m u s e u m should act as a place
of m e m o r y ("recalling" District Six). It should not be a
conventional m u s e u m with artefacts and displays sim
ply to be looked at. Instead, it should be a place where
people can "write their o w n history" rather than having
it written or interpreted for them by others.
A n edited book39 with contributions from m a n y
of the first and continuing members of the Museum ' s
Foundation brings out a variety of further goals. The
m u s e u m should act as a place of healing: the goal should
be to "forgive but not forget". It should also serve as a
base for land claims and land restitution. It should be
community-based but also move toward becoming a
marker for a national history of forced removals and the
undoing of official histories for both the area and the
nation.
As those diverse statements suggest, the several stake
holders brought no single agenda to what the m u s e u m
should be like (some asked if it should be a m u s e u m at
all). There should be community "participation". The
m u s e u m should be "a living space", "an interactive
space". It would also have to be planned within the con
straints of the space available and minimal funds (the
Project Director started work with no salary). M u c h of
the current substantial funding comes from interna
tional organisations, and the only joining with other
m useum s to date is with "a coalition of historic site
m useum s of conscience" in several other countries.
Diversity marked also the conceptual positions that
people brought to discussions about the form that the
m u s e u m and its exhibitions might take. I shall have
occasion to come back to these at a later point. Briefly,
however, the main conceptual concerns were with the
nature of narrative, the nature of memory , the role
of the "art practitioner", and the place of words. The
m u s e u m is in fact rich in the extent to which these
expressions of theory have been made both explicit and
specifically linked to some features of the space and its
exhibitions.
To expand on these general features, I begin as
before with a brief "visitor's view", and then move to a
more historical view of beginnings and the growth of
exhibitions. The source materials are again a mixture of
observations at a time of visiting the m u s e u m , printed
text, and interview comments - in this case, comments
from the museum's director, Sandra Prosalendis.
A Visitor's Eye View
What stands out on first entering this m u s e u m is its
vibrancy. It is rich in colour and textures, with a variety
of painted surfaces, wood, fabrics, drawings and photo
graphs.
The main m u s e u m room is m a d e up of the old
central church with viewing balconies, used also as
exhibition areas and as hanging places for banners.
While the walls are covered with paintings and pic
tures, the floor of the central area is dominated by a
m a p showing the streets of the district. It is large (7 x
5 metres). O n a plastic overlay, ex-residents have writ
ten their names on the spaces where their homes once
stood. This m a p can be walked on, as if retracing the
streets again. Dominating also is a sculpture near the
114 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION a» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
floor m a p , a stand of old street signs.
There are no traditional glass cases with specimens
and labels. There is also no reverent silence except for
official m u s e u m voices or selected story-tellers. Instead
there is a diversity of voices. These range from the
voices of people in the communi ty w h o use the space
as a gathering point, with w o m e n embroidering some
of the names of ex-residents inscribed on cloth (the
m u s e u m brochure also notes that further embroidery of
these "name-cloths" is being done by w o m e n in prison),
to the sounds of children running in the crèche above
the back rooms of the m u s e u m .
These back rooms are used both for exhibition space
and for a café. The café, however, does not present itself
as a commercial enterprise. Instead it offers older-style
teacups and h o m e m a d e cakes and biscuits, adding to
the sense of being invited into a communi ty gathering
space, or a corner café with regular guests.
Overall, the space does not present itself as being
intended for the foreign visitor, though the addition of
a bookstore with postcards and books on African poli
tics, and two explanatory banners close to but not at the
opening, seem to be the beginnings of catering to such
audiences. The guide m a p for the m u s e u m , however,
does not offer a history of the m u s e u m . It does offer, in
contrast, a description of the m u s e u m ' s purpose and
the present exhibition's format. The m u s e u m ' s director
(Sandra Prosalendis) agrees that there is a gap, a prob
lem with assuming that visitors already k n o w some
thing about the history of District Six or other areas of
apartheid removal. The m u s e u m group, she commented
in 2001, had not yet decided h o w to fill the gap.
Are these intended features?
The gap sensed by the foreign visitor could stem from the
sense that interpreting and presenting the story as 'his
tory' is not in keeping with the view that the community
is still alive and evolving. It could also be that tourists are
meant to be taken aback by the gaps in their knowledge,
by a sense of unawareness or minimal knowledge as well
as by a sense of affinity with the themes of loss, survival,
and celebration. They should perhaps 'feel first' and then
'go away and learn more'. For this visitor, however, Sandy
Prosalendis' recognition of the gap seems genuine.
Intended certainly is the impression of a special kind
of space. The space is meant to be highly evocative, both
of the physical and the emotional quality of District Six.
In Peggy Delport's description:
"District Six . . . was simultaneously a landscape and
an urban entity, a site with a distinct topographical
identity: connected to mountain and sea, to slopes, to
levels, to inner city, docks and harbour. So, too, the
District Six M u s e u m space has a geography. It is c o m
prised of both the openness and totality of its inte
rior: immediately high and low, both exposed and
hidden. It has a distinctly spatial existence, within
which material traces and features are signposts
of the social and physical existence of District Six.
Flights of steps, passageways, landings, floors, walls,
interiors, echo the steep, simultaneously private
and public, city and mountain-bound nature of the
place . . . Like the actual place that existed beyond
its walls, the M u s e u m is also a site of interconnec
tions: of highs and lows, of light and dark, of stillness
and the clamour of sound. Routes and transitional
spaces connect one level to another, lead from one
focus to another. Soft, moving elements, like the ban
ners, cloths and transparent gauze-printed portraits,
bridge the spatial and structural divide, fall from the
highest ledge to the floor".40
Intended also is the visitor's being drawn into a search
for discovery and meaning. Ex-residents with their
instant recognition of some streets and places are drawn
into discovering others: both other streets and other peo
ple. People w h o did not live there or have not themselves
been physically dispossessed are meant to be provoked
into a search for meaning. Children, for example, c o m e
in, discover where their parents and others lived, and are
moved to ask for more or to question the adults' stories:
Main sources were again direct observation, printed material, and an interview, in this case
with the Museum's former Director Sandra Prosalendis. The main printed text is an edited
book by Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) Recalling Community in Cape Town.
Op.cit.
39 Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds. I (2001) ibid.
40
Delport, P. (2001) "Digging Deeper in District Six: Features and Interfaces in a Curatorial
Landscape". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.l (20011 ibid., p. 154.
Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit., pp. 99-100.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 115
"The local school children seemingly struggle to go
beyond what is visible, engage earnestly, explain to
younger ones, add their voices with eloquence, find
themselves within the M u s e u m " . 4 1
Intended also is the effect of colour, one of the results of
consultation before the first major exhibition:
"Aesthetic form was not formal veneer but emerged
in active partnership. By way of illustration, in dis
cussion with the ex-residents . . . it was felt that the
spirit and aesthetic character of the exhibition
Streets should be one that did not m o u r n but instead
celebrated the cultural diversity that once existed
in the District. The banners, bunting, images and
artefacts which m a d e reference to the rituals and liv
ing patterns of daily life were historical factors, but
the theme of celebration was defined through the
colours, emphases, and contrasts of aesthetic order
ing".42
Hence then, to take some specific examples, "the domi
nant earthy-orange tones" and the blue of the floor m a p ,
and the vivid colour of the banners on both the interior
and exterior walls of the museum. 4 3
Backgrounds and Beginnings
This background is divided into two parts, one related to
the district itself, the other to the m u s e u m .
Background for the area:
The n a m e of the area - District Six - dates from 1840. This
was the sixth of the twelve areas marked out when Cape
T o w n became a municipality. The area, close to the city
and sloping up to the mountain, quickly became densely
populated. Its population was diverse:
"To it came rural migrants from every part of Africa
... British workers seeking to find their fortunes in the
colonies . . . Jews fleeing Tsarist Russia . . . hundreds
from the West Coast of India .. . countless numbers
of St. Helenans, Australians" (especially after the end
of the "gold rush"), "black Americans, people from
the Caribbean and almost from wherever one cares
to mention".44
Its population was also both fluid and stable. M a n y
moved in or out. For m a n y others, however, the District
was h o m e for several generations. At the time of being
dispossessed, for example, some families had lived in the
one house for forty years ("my heart still aches" says one
inscription). A n d one family at least (Noor Ebrahim's)
had seen four generations and more than thirty children
born under the roof of the h o m e reduced to rubble.45
In type, most of the housing consisted of rows of ter
race houses, with m a n y people in the one house. That
feature, several ex-residents have pointed out, made the
streets all the more significant. The streets were where
one played, gossiped, or traded. The streets were also
the markers for safe and less-safe places ("mean streets")
and the routes one walked.
"Along streets w e all made our way, linking beacons
of h o m e , school and the shop. In a recurring dream
bordering on nightmare, I pick m y way in a nauseat
ing dread along the Main Road toward school, bear
ing a heavy suitcase, dodge for protection into shop
doorways; and from the city, liberated, I trek h o m e
ward on the High Level Road. A n d memories press
forward".46
Streets, for Lalou Meltzer, are then the ways by which
shared memories of District Six are revived. They are
"the hook" by which w e retrieve the "flesh" of memories,
"the taste-smell of what was there". They are, to take part
of the slogan on the back of T-shirts made for a student
project, "Highways Into the Past".47
Those memories of the area, as Meltzer's comment
suggests, are not all positive. They range, in the chap
ters from Rassool and Prosalendis' edited recollections,
from "nightmare" to "a w a r m and caring community",
"an area resounding with laughter and music", "the
City's Left Bank" with its mixture of musicians, artists,
and writers, an area where "colour did not matter", a
"hive of political activity".
Demolition and its sequels. The city's official descrip
tions of the area were far less positive. The area faced its
first demolition and forced removal in 1901 in the n a m e
ll6 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION » MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
of threats to health (the removal was of "Africans" to
an outlying area).48 The more extensive demolition and
removals, however, began later (1968) and continued
through to 1982.
The destruction of the area was not without protest.
O n e was in the form of a large scale 65 metre exterior
mural painted on the wall of the Holy Cross Catholic
Centre: the wall that faces the depopulated area. Enti
tled 'Res Clamant - the Earth Cries Out' , it was painted
... in the final days of the destruction .. . . The theme in
the central panel is one of emptiness." Its images "range
from a figure group of the last family to depart from
District Six ... to images of birds, for these were the
only signs of life after the depopulation . . . . The dense
'narrative border' ('narrative' because its base is mainly
verbal) surrounding the central space .. . utilises the
theme of 'street'. It comprises massed images referring
to the activities of daily living, and the visual character
is one of fullness .. . This theme was chosen by the nar
rators" (these were the ex-residents) "as representative
of a valued aspect of the life they had k n o w n that was
markedly missing in the n e w localities".49
Protests of a more conventional type came especially
in relation to redevelopment: with the building in the
area of a n e w campus for the Cape Technikon (a col
lege for white students only), the threatened closure of
Zonnebloem College, established in i860 and not for
whites, the proposal to build luxury housing for col
oured public servants, and the proposals for redevelop-
ments by large companies such as Shell, Total, and B.P .
Protests against redevelopment held more promise. The
large companies especially had some sensitivity to the
threats of stigma. In addition, the issues of destruc
tion and redevelopment were becoming more explicitly
politicised (one sign of this is Mandela's visit to the area
in 1993, with the promise that "not a stone should be
moved from Horstley Street".50) A s well, the National
Party had increasingly severe problems (popular rebel
lion, states of emergency) on its hands.
Fuelling the protests were at least two agendas. O n e
of these was to ensure that some land remained vacant
so that in time land restitution could occur. S o m e
return should be possible (40 hectares were returned
for restitution purposes in November 2000). The other
was that the blank areas should remain as in themselves
a memorial. The raw areas, the highly visible scarred
slopes, would in themselves serve as a reminder of what
had occurred.
Background for the m u s e u m
Noted in Chapter 3 was the need for detailed accounts
of h o w changes come about, of h o w general ideas are
translated into specific actions. The District Six M u s e u m
stands out for the extent to which several accounts of
steps along the way to a m u s e u m have appeared in print,
providing a vivid record of agreements, differences, and
negotiations and of the goals and concepts that guided
the steps toward a m u s e u m with a particular shape.
These detail the search for a site, the search for a format,
and a first 'collection' (a collection of street signs).
How did the idea arise? The book edited by Rassool
and Prosalendis starts with the frank acknowledgement
that "there are m a n y versions .. . Something apparently
as simple as w h e n the idea of a District Six M u s e u m
was voiced, in what company, and with what intent, has
proved complicated and even contentious".51
There is agreement, however, that a formal resolution
was passed at a large public meeting held in July 1988
called by a group with the n a m e "Hands Off District
ibid., p. 160. The m u s e u m has a deliberate policy of encouraging students to act as guides
in the m u s e u m , p " Delport, P. (2001) "Signposts for Retrieval: A Visual Framework for Enabling M e m o r y of
Place and Time". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) ibid., p. 38.
1 3 ibid., p.38.
1 4 Soudien, C . (2001) "Holding O n To The Past: Working With The 'Myths' O f District Six".
In
Described in Ebrahim, N . (2001 ) "Guided M o m e n t s in the District Six M u s e u m " . In Rassool,
C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001 ) Op.cit, p.58.
Lalou Meltzer in Meltzer, L. (2001) "Past Streets". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.)
(2001). Op.cit., p.22.
' ' ibid., p.22.
Rassool, C . and T h o m e J, (2001 ) " A Timeline for District Six: A Parallel Text." In Rassool, C .
and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit., p.109.
Delport, P. (2001) "Signposts for Retrieval: A Visual Framework for Enabling M e m o r y of
Place and Time", pp.33-34. In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis. S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit. The
mural was painted by Peggy Delport, c.1983. "The title Res Clamant - The Earth Cries Out
was drawn from a sermon given in the Holy Cross Catholic Church in 1982 on the anni
versary of the . . . Six Group Areas Declaration of February 1996. The full title'Res Clamant
ad D o m i n u m ' refers to the biblical parable of Naboth's Vineyard in which the king covets
Naboth's piece of land, and w h e n it is refused takes it by force" (p.44).
' ° Rassool, C and T h o m e , I. (2001 ) " A Timeline for District Six: A Parallel Text". In Rassool, C
and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit.
Prosalendis, S. (2001 ) "Foreword". InRassookC and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit., p.v.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY UJ
Six" (an earlier and apparently less activist group had
the n a m e : "Friends of District Six"). There is also agree
ment that a Foundation with the task of establishing a
m u s e u m was established within the following year.
Agreed upon as well is that the group which began
working toward a m u s e u m was diverse, mixing ex-resi
dents and people from other areas and mixing people
with a variety of skills and backgrounds. In Fredericks'
description, the group came to include "former resi
dents and long-time political activists from District Six,
political and cultural activists from nearby Walmer
Estate, Woodstock and Salt River, and academics inter
ested in the city's cultural history".52 A m o n g them also
were Bill Masson (a m e m b e r of the Oral History Project
at the University of Cape Town) and Peggy Delport,
w h o later played a major curatorial role for several exhi
bitions ("a great 'catch', because she brought with her
skills and knowledge base in the fine arts").53
The group was not static. Vincent Kolbe recalls that
"a political agenda, forged by A n w a h Nagia" (his inter
ests were strongly in land restitution), "saw the exit of
several prominent members".54 Overall, however, the
group remained large and steady.
The search for a site. H o w does space become avail
able? The plan m a y have been for a "community-ori
ented" m u s e u m . Not all members of the community,
however, were interested in contributing a site. Freder
icks (the first chairperson of the District Six Founda
tion) remembers a series of unsuccessful approaches to
several sources: Zonnebloem College, Bishop Tutu, the
Cape Technikon (its Moravian Chapel did later serve
as a temporary site during renovation in 1999), the City
Council.55 Success came at last in the person of a leader
within the Methodist Mission Church - Stan Abrahams.
This congregation was considering a merger with
a congregation in the central city and had "appar
ently ... already toyed with the idea of a museum" . 5 6
Abrahams, and presumably the Church, came with his
o w n contribution to the visions of what the m u s e u m
might be. It would bear "witness", would "memorialise
the history of struggle and resistances", would
be "a space for the healing of memories . . . . W e can
forgive but never forget".57
The search for a format. The founding group was
clear about what the m u s e u m would not be. It would
not be "the type of m u s e u m that exhibited the historic
accomplishments of a privileged section. It would be a
living people's place, where the people's history would
be recorded"58, but "not a place where you come to view
artefacts. It's something that you become involved in".59
A first indication of what the format might be comes
by way of the 1992 exhibition. The advertisement was
for "a photographic exhibition, drama, poetry reading,
music, discussions, and videos", with the photographs
recalling the area as it was (they were photographs from
ex-residents). Used also was a form of participation that
has continued:
" A length of unbleached calico was pinned to the wall,
large felt-tipped pens were placed nearby and people
began to write their names, old addresses in District
Six, messages and memories. So the hundreds of
metres of inscribed name-cloths began to grow, and
the principle of inscription and the emergence of
voices as a generative force giving direction to the
aesthetic form and function of the M u s e u m became
embedded in the life of the M u s e u m " . 6 0
A further indication of what the format might be - one
leading to another continuing feature of the exhibitions
(its emphasis on "streets" and, more broadly, on " m a p
ping") - comes from a review of "foundation moments"
in the museum's history. This review is by Prosalendis,
Marot, Soudien and Nagia. The m o m e n t is after the first
exhibition, at a time when there were in hand two dona
tions: a space and some minimal funds (from an interna
tional organisation). N o w :
"It was necessary to develop from an entirely volun
tary process, with an inherent impermanence, to a
sustainable organisation accountable to the donors
and the community. There was a dawning realisation
that it is one thing to have a dream and to be filled
with moral passion, another to give this a material
reality".61
A n anchoring point came with the acquisition of a set of
street signs:
ll8 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
"In our casting about, w e became aware of a secret col
lection of street signs and traced them to the cellar of
a house in Mowbray. The collector was in fact a fore
m a n , w h o , acting on behalf of apartheid's infamous
and ironically named Department of Communi ty
Development, had been briefed to ' d u m p District
Six in Table Bay'. H e did his job well: the rubble of
District Six is the landfill beneath Duncan Dock.
However, the street signs did not accompany the rub
ble. For whatever reason, these he systematically col
lected and saved.
Negotiations were difficult: H e was anxious
about meeting us, scared of being prosecuted for
'war crimes'. Some of our members were bitter and
resented him, wanting no dealings with everything he
stood for. However, the power of this remaining con
crete evidence of District Six was stronger than both
fear and anger. It took several meetings to negotiate
his donation of the signs to the m u s e u m , but eventu
ally - with the assistance of a local artist - they were
hung in a series of ladders, filling the empty space of
the church. They began to work their magic: a step
in healing and reconciliation in a divided society
The signs acted as a catalyst for new ideas and, at last,
our exhibition had a n a m e : Streets".bI
D. District Six Expanded:
The Growth O f Exhibitions
The District Six M u s e u m has n o w put on a series of
exhibitions. It has many visitors - local and international
- and several sources of financial support, from within
and outside South Africa.
H o w did it reach this point? Compared with m a n y
museums , this one is marked by the extent to which
people put into print their accounts of growth, expand
ing even on their records of the first steps toward
its making. At this point there also emerge stronger
statements about concepts that guided the form of
the m u s e u m and its exhibitions. W e have seen one set
of guiding concepts in an earlier chapter, in the form
of communities of practice, linked particularly to a
museum's approach to community participation and
involvement (Chapter 4). W e n o w see concepts related
more to the nature of narrative and memory . These are
linked again to steps taken toward community involve
ment. They are linked as well to the visual shape of the
m u s e u m and the nature of its exhibitions.
As a way into the growth of the m u s e u m , I shall
focus on two of its exhibitions. A two-week preliminary
exhibition (1992) has already been mentioned. This was
an exhibition seen as testing the level of community
interest. A m o n g those that followed were the exhibition
opening in 1994 and k n o w n as Streets: Retracing District
Six, and the exhibition opening in 2000 k n o w n as Dig
ging Deeper. This is not to downplay the importance of
several other exhibitions. The m u s e u m has, for instance,
been the site of a series of photographic exhibitions, giv
ing pride of place to a form of expression that is also part
of the two large exhibitions to be noted. Streets, however,
was the first major exhibition and m a n y of its aspects
became continuing features for the m u s e u m (floor m a p ,
street signs, photographs, 'name-cloths', oral histories).
Digging Deeper is the exhibition that contains expan
sions in physical space, and a move toward m e m o r y
expressed in both "a public domain" (streets) and the
"interior domains" of rooms within houses.
" Fredericks, T . (2001 ) "Creating the District Six M u s e u m " . In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S.
(Eds.) (2001) Op.cit., p.14.
53ibid.,p.l3.
5 4 Kolbe, V . (2001) " M u s e u m Beginnings". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001 )
Op.cit.,p.l6.
Fredericks, T . (2001) "Creating the District Six M u s e u m " . In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S.
(Eds.) (2001)Op.cit.,p.l4.
ibid., p. 14.
Abrahams, S. (2001) " A Place of Sanctuary". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001)
Op.cit., pp.3-4.
Combrlnck, I. ( 2001 ) " A M u s e u m of Consciousness". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds. )
(2001) Op.cit., p . 10. Combrinck was "born and bred" in District Six, and a trustee for the
Museum.
59
Combrinck cited by Rassool, C . (20011 "Introduction: Recalling Community in Cape Town".
In Rassool, C and Prosalendis, S. (Eds. I (2001). Op.cit., p.ix.
Delport, P. (2001) "Digger Deeper in District Six: Features and Interfaces in a Curatorial
Landscape". In Rassool, C and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (20011 Op.cit., p . 158.
Prosalendis, S., Marot, I., Soudien, C , and Nagia, A . (2001 ) "Punctuations: Periodic Impres
sions of a M u s e u m " . In Rassool, C and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit., p.80.
62ibid.,pp.80-81.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 119
Streets: Retracing the District
(Exhibition 1)
This exhibition needs to be described both in terms of
its physical features and their links to underlying princi
ples. The exhibition was "conceptualised and formulated
collectively by a broadly composed working group and
curated by Peggy Delport".63 It is from Delport's accounts
that I shall mainly draw.
"In describing the nature of Streets, I wish to empha
sise that its physical character reflected concerns that
were central to the research work as a whole. This
focus included the notion of accessibility, the crea
tion of a generative arena for historical retrieval and
interpretation and the interrelationship of historical
method and aesthetics".64
H o w were these concerns reflected? O n e reflection was
by way of the street map painted on the floor. It showed
- in bright ochre and blue colours - the street network of
the District prior to demolition. It was not simply to be
looked at:
"The m a p was covered with a strong transparent plas
tic layer on which children could run, and ex-resi
dents could search for old locations. This surface was
densely marked in coloured pens with the memories
of people and events, names of omitted streets and
lanes, messages and further comments".65
A second example is provided by the name-cloths:
" N o w hundreds of metres long and still expanding,
these closely written surfaces have been a growing,
permanent feature, hanging vertically in the high
space. They have been perused and further inscribed
daily with names, old addresses and fragments of
information about ex-residents of District Six and
their descendants".66
S o m e messages have even been embroidered, and visi
tors from outside District Six have added their messages
as well.
A third example comes b y w a y of the boxes:
"Directly below the street names, three transparent
perspex boxes placed on the edge of the m a p were
filled with the clay soil and stones of District Six. O n
the earth were placed the archaeological fragments
from a current excavation, mainly relics of domestic
life such as a child's doll, cutlery, shards of crockery
and little bottles".67
Near these were also placed shelves "for receiving addi
tional artefacts and memorabilia".68
A fourth translation consists of the street signs
themselves. Physically, these were "strung together in
three tall columns, hung suspended above one end of
the floor map" . 6 9 "The lines and names of the streets
on the floor m a p were painted in the same dark blue
as the original, slightly rusted, white and ultramarine
street n a m e signs".70 Conceptually, the signs recall
for those w h o lived in the District the places in which
they played, and gossiped, the paths they took to
and from h o m e to school or work. For viewers from
outside the District, the street signs are intended to
evoke a sense of their o w n past and its changes:
"The most central word images in the M u s e u m are
those in the street signs . . . . Here, each street sign
becomes a single image in itself: a synthesis of an
intense particularity of place, object and material.
The n a m e itself is image, and the blue and white
enamelled, rusted signs evoke countless other layers
of imagery in relation to different histories and expe
rience of each visitor".71
Digging Deeper (Exhibition 2)
This major exhibition opened in September 2000 after
a seventeen month closure of the church for renovation
and the planning of the n e w exhibition (a temporary
exhibit with m a n y of the main features of Streets - e.g.
the floor m a p , the name-cloths, the photographs - was
offered in the Moravian Chapel within the once all-white
Technikon).
Between the two exhibitions there occurred major
changes in funding. A m o n g the "major donors" listed
120 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION >> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
in 2001 are governments, agencies, and organisations
from several countries outside Africa (Norway, Spain,
Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States). The
government of South Africa heads the list. Between
the two exhibitions also there occurred a particular
source of research funding that helped both the plan
ning of the exhibition and the publications related to
it and the m u s e u m . Peggy Delport comments on this
research support as assisting especially the group work
that was a feature of both the research project and of the
exhibition itself (this group work is also noted in the
museum's brochure).
"The National Research Foundation (NRF) funded
a two-year Award for T e a m Research linking aca
demic institutions and a public culture institution,
the District Six M u s e u m , in a research and training
project. Researchers included Crain Soudien (Team
Leader), Peggy Delport and Shamil Jeppie from the
University of Cape T o w n ( U C T ) , Ciraj Rassool from
the University of the Western Cape ( U W C ) and
Sandy Prosalendis from the District Six M u s e u m .
U W C ' s Gary Minkley and Leslie Witz participated in
workshops and Premesh Lalu contributed to exhibi
tion research. Other researchers and graduate stu
dents from all three institutions included Tina Smith,
Jos Thorne, Patrick Fefeza and Luvuyo Dondolo.
Digging Deeper, its linked projects and ensuing
publications is the major outcome of the research
project".72
For the exhibition itself, the team was somewhat reshuf
fled but the group effort remained:
"The curatorial exhibition team: Peggy Delport, Tina
Smith, Jos Thorne, Garth Erasmus and Rose Gaines;
on the research and editorial side, Ciraj Rassool,
Crain Soudien and Sandy Prosalendis. There have
also been numerous other artists, assistants and vol
unteers w h o are acknowledged elsewhere".73
W h a t then was added to the continuing features of the
M u s e u m ? A n d what were the guiding principles to these
additions? In summary form, the main additions are
listed below, with the first two expressing the notion of
"Digging Deeper" in both a physical and an experiential
sense.
• In a n e w hall, a further floor. This is the Poet's Floor.
The surface is again ochre-earth in colour. Embedded
in it are "little white ceramic notes, hand written in
cobalt blue. The texts mingle with scattered images of
linoleum fragments in bright mosaic . . . . A reference
to the ... excavation of seventeen layers of linoleum
on the site of a Horstley home." 7 4
• A mini-excavation site on a higher level. Here "a pit
opens up deep and brightly lit: a scaled d o w n doll's
house size version of the foundations of a Horstley
Street house. It is like looking d o w n the wrong end of
a telescope".75
The other changes focus more on digging deeper into
qualities of experience. These are in the form of memory
rooms. O f these, the first two are re-creations, by their
ex-residents, of the qualities of their lives in District Six.
The third is a Sound Archive for m a n y memories. In each
area, the focus is a room, chosen for some particular rea
sons:
"In making the m e m o r y rooms .. . the m u s e u m had
tried to find a method of exploring lives and space.
The ' room' became a certain aesthetic organisation
in the M u s e u m ; a trope through which certain lived
experiences could be reproduced. The ' room' had
been the basic shape of the working class family in
District Six. People would ask newly married cou-
Delport, P. (2001) "Signposts for Retrieval: A Visual Framework for Enabling M e m o r y of
Place and Time". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001 ) Op.cit., p.44.
ibid., p.36.
6 5 ibid., p.36.
ibid., p.36.
ibid., p.34.
ibid., p.36.
ibid., p.34.
7 0 ibid., p.34.
Delport, P. (2001) "Digger Deeper in District Six: Features and Interfaces in a Curatorial
Landscape". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit., p.162.
72ibid.,p.l63. 73
ibid., p . 164.
'4ibid.,p.l56.
75ibid.,p.l56.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 121
pies whether they had found a ' room' to stay in, not
a 'house'. People adapted to the imposed physical
structure of the room. The ' m e m o r y room' concept is
thus an aesthetic mapping of that working class lived
experience in the M u s e u m " . 7 6
• Nomvuyo ' s room. This is a domestic space, complete
with bed, dining table, an old radiogram, a cooking
space in the corner. Here "the M u s e u m worked closely
with N o m v u y o Ngcelwane to reconstruct her family
h o m e . . . . The room reflects her memories of the view
of the docks and .. . the multiple views of the room ...
(The room) is a gallery of voices .. . . Created inside an
old radiogram (are) selections of stories which relate
to mealtimes, furniture, the arrangement of space in
the h o m e , gender and familial relations".77
The emphasis on a domestic space, Layne and Rassool
note, "draws on the specific example of the Workers'
M u s e u m in Copenhagen and the Age Exchange in Black-
hall, London".78 The "social realism" of the room is meant
to provoke in visitors "a sense of familiarity".79 The "oral
testimony" is n o w "not merely supplementary evidence
to fill in the gaps in the written record. Instead it enables
questions to be raised about the processing of m e m o r y
and the ways in which lives are narrated and re-nar
rated".8
The general quality, Delport adds, is one of positive
closeness. The rooms' objects are carefully chosen to
be hand-made, the dominant colours are w a r m (ochre
and yellow). Both objects and colours "describe homes,
return again to those warm-bodied, ever-absorbing
symbols of childhood".81
• Rod's R o o m . In contrast to Nomvuyo ' s room, Rod's
R o o m is a reminder of subject and object relations
under apartheid. Visually, the room is scraped-back,
with the rough walls catching the eye. (The floor
holds a folded bedcover). In the walls are embedded
segments of "racial texts", records of the "buying and
selling of slaves", identity cards, "coloured discourse
of racial identity".82 Curated by Roderick Sauls, an
ex-resident of District Six, here "individual m e m o r y
and a sense of selfhood are counterposed to attempts
.. . to constitute racial subjects".83 Here, Delport adds,
the walls are deliberately "raw-textured", n o w "like
the nerve-ends of m e m o r y : partly concealed, scraped,
embedded, imprinted".84
• A M e m o r y R o o m that is part of the Sound Archive
and also functions as a recording studio. Sound is
a general feature of the M u s e u m not only in the
oral histories but also in the form of songs, poems,
"conversations held around the m a p , and stories told
by the education officers".85 This particular room,
however, is once again the merger of several agendas:
"It was conceived as an archive of music. O n to this,
the museum's life history and oral work was grafted
.. . . It has to provide capacity for the M u s e u m to col
lect and to archive music, oral history and culture.
As discussions ... progressed, it was felt that such an
archive would also .. . have to find ways of capturing
the ephemeral performances of m e m o r y that unfold
in the M u s e u m ... a way to demonstrate its commit
ment ... to the people from w h o m it has collected
oral and musical histories".86
The result is a room that is technically "capable of
approximately broadcast-quality recordings".87 Visually,
the furniture and the paintings on the walls "signal the
décor of a sitting room in a h o m e ... a place where the
individual is encouraged to take on a confessional m o d e ,
to be vulnerable in a secure environment".88
Photographs. The final feature to be noted has to do
with a particular use of photographs. Photographs have
consistently been a feature of this m u s e u m , and several
exhibitions have revolved around collections of photo
graphs of the District that were taken at different times.
Digging Deeper aimed at changing the ways in which
meanings were conveyed, at going beyond photographs'
documentary meanings.
For this feature I draw especially from a chapter
by Tina Smith and Ciraj Rassool.89 They note first the
recurring use of photographs not simply as "they are"
but also in ways - enlarged, coloured, overlaid - that
create "life histories" and "enable the visitor to simulate
the experience of walking into the time space and the
worlds of the District".90
For Digging Deeper, "the portraits have been re-
122 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <w MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
printed on .. . light and transparent material. Larger
than life, and massed on both sides of the gallery, they
create a balance and a symmetry ... (with) a quality of
airiness".91 The presence of these "visual biographies
... acknowledges the importance of individual lives . . . .
But their lightness, airiness and movement . . . have the
quality of enabling life histories to be seen .. . in ways
other than as fixed, given, or uncontested".92 That "not
fixed" quality is conveyed also by the juxtaposition of
photographs that tell of lives that were interconnected
in private but not in public, and of uses and re-uses over
time that promote an awareness of photographs as hav
ing "social lives after their creation ... that . . . also fed
into their meanings".93
A text in the Memorial Hall. The last feature to Dig
ging Deeper is part of its aim to be a record of more
than District Six. The hope is that the m u s e u m will
become a reminder of a larger national history of dis
possession. For this, the Memorial Text is a prominent
example. I quote it in full:
"Remember Dimbaza.
Remember Botshabelo/Onverwacht
South End, East Bank,
Sophiatown, Makuleke, Cato Manor.
Remember District Six.
Remember the racism
which took away our homes
and our livelihood
and which sought
to steal away our humanity.
Remember also our will to live,
To hold fast to that
which marks us as h u m a n beings:
our generosity, our love of justice
and our care for each other.
Remember Tramway Road,
Modderdam, Simonstown.
In remembering w e do not want
To recreate District Six
But to work with its m e m o r y :
of hurts inflicted and received,
of loss, achievements and of shames.
W e wish to remember
so that w e can all,
together and by ourselves,
rebuild a city
which belongs to all of us,
in which all of us can live,
not as races but as people.94
In time, several contributors note, the hope is that Dis
trict Six will evoke memories and build both insights
and a firmness of purpose that help promote recon
ciliation elsewhere and avoid the recurrence of destruc
tion, dispossession and loss. Whether that aim can be
achieved and the m u s e u m remain at the same time a liv
ing, vibrant space remains to be seen.
E. A Highlighted Issue:
Some Recurring Concepts
Each of the previous m u s e u m chapters has ended with
comments on a particular issue: one highlighted by the
museums considered but relevant to m a n y others. For
the South African M u s e u m , for example, the highlighted
issue was the place of bodies in museums . Claims both
for repatriation and for respectful display highlight that
issue. Less defensively, they underline also the need for
museums to consider carefully the significance of bodies
Layne, V . and Rassool, C . (2001) " M e m o r y R o o m s : Oral History in the District Six M u s e u m " .
In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001 ) Op.cit, p.149.
77ibid.,pp.l49-150.
' 8 ibid., p.149.
' 9 ibid., p. 149.
8 0 ibid., p.149.
Delport, P. (2001) Op.cit. p.154.
1 Layne, V . and Rassool, C . (2001) Op.cit, p.152.
89
ibid.,p.l52.
4Delport,P. (2001) Op.cit,pp.154-156.
5 Layne, V . and Rassool, C . (2001) Op.cit, p.153.
6ibid.,pp.l47-148.
' ibid.,p.l52.
°ibid.,p.l54.
Smith, T. and Rassool, C . (2001) "History in Photographs at the District Six M u s e u m " . In
Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit, pp. 131-145.
ibid.,p.l38.
'ibid.,p.l41.
2ibid.,p.l41.
3 ibid., p. 142. i
Prosalendis, S. (2001) "Foreword". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit,
p.vi.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 123
to both museums and the people represented, to exam
ine methods of collection and display, and to re-consider
concepts of ownership or guardianship.
For the Australian M u s e u m (Chapter 4), the high
lighted issue was the presence and nature of comparison
markers: markers that a community and/or m u s e u m
staff can turn to as indicators of what is possible, and
that m a k e concrete descriptions of m u s e u m s as always
needing to be considered 'in context'. The marker cho
sen was the nature of Aboriginal involvement in video
and film production. Here was a highly visible exam
ple of community consultation and community control
over access to places and people and over the process
of production and review. Here also was the opportu
nity to examine the specific ways in which some core
Aboriginal values were both like and unlike those of
non-Aboriginals, influencing the approaches of both to
methods of production, reviewing, and display. Values
related to 'secret' material and restricted audiences pro
vided the specific case.
For the present chapter, the topic chosen has to do
with conceptual positions and their translation into
m u s e u m practice. Conceptual bases and their specific
translations are part of all m u s e u m s . They are, h o w
ever, unusually explicit in accounts of the District
Six M u s e u m . They also take a form that is different
from that seen earlier in Chapter 3 (Sydney's Austral
ian M u s e u m ) . There the emphasis was on developing
"communities of practice". The two m u s e u m s , as noted
earlier, share one c o m m o n interest. This is in ways of
encouraging community involvement and visitors'
engagement with what they see. The kinds of concepts
turned to, however, and the translations into practice,
differ between the two places.
In the positions brought to bear on the District Six
M u s e u m , two conceptual concerns stand out. O n e has
to do with the nature and significance of narratives.
The second has to do with the nature and significance
of m e m o r y .
The Nature and Significance of Narratives
For this topic, I draw especially on the views expressed in
chapters by Crain Soudien and Lalou Meltzer (two of the
people with an early engagement with the past and pos
sible future of District Six) and by Sandra Prosalendis,
Jennifer Marot, Crain Soudien, and A n w a h Nagia.95
These are people marked by close involvement with both
the m u s e u m and with District Six itself.
Soudien and Meltzer start with a distinction between
"official" and "popular" narratives. The former, in the
case of District Six, are essentially derogatory (a "slum",
a "blight on the landscape"). They are also - as they
tend to be wherever they are applied - "dry and h o m o g
enising". This is an area, for example, that is occupied
only by people w h o are "coloured". These are people
w h o will all be better off if they are moved elsewhere.
In contrast, popular narratives are seen as being more
vivid and open to re-invention, and as taking more note
of the individual:
"Embedded in popular narratives, w e argue, is the
penchant for exaggeration, as opposed to the dry
and unimpeachable empiricism of the official ... the
power of invention and renewal It matters not ...
that the details of the story are wrong. W h a t matters
is the right to remake".96
"District Sixers come, literally, in all shapes and
sizes . . . this is precisely what the homogenising
narrative of the official, in its production of only a
decadent working class, is intrinsically unable to cap
ture".97
This distinction between official and popular narratives,
however, could be relatively empty. It is in fact accompa
nied by views about what popular narratives can achieve
beyond re-invention. T w o functions stand out. O n e has
to do with overcoming the damage of the past. The other
has to do with the development of insights that can be
carried forward and affect the occurrence and impact of
future social events.
Overcoming the damage of the past starts with the
opportunity for people to "repossess" the past98, to write
their " o w n history", "to describe themselves as they
wish to be seen".99 People become "the subjects of the
stories of District Six", rather than the objects of oth
ers' stories.100 They come to recognise in themselves not
only their past lack of power but also their "resilience",
their capacity to survive, their "potential for co-exist
ence".101
124 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Developing strengths that carry forward - influenc
ing again both one's o w n existence and the possibility
of nation-building - is the aim underlying the emphasis,
within accounts of District Six, on recognising that all
accounts are partial. Ideally, to take up again Soudien
and Meltzer's argument, any exhibition should encour
age people to recognise that all narratives "because they
are h u m a n are also partial, incomplete, and unavoid
ably ideological . . . . They include and exclude differ
ent people at different times".102 The hope then is that
the m u s e u m will encourage people to ask: " W h o do
w e include or exclude? W h o is privileged or marginal
ized?"103 More subtly, the aim is for people to develop
"some caution ... in casting one's role in favour of one
or the other claim" and to consider "the actions and
meanings w e are contractually binding ourselves to in
choosing one story over another".104
Exhibitions then should display in practice, and
encourage in viewers, caution when it comes to the pos
sible exchange of one simplified narrative for another
(the re-essentialising concern noted also in Chapter
4). There is the danger, Soudien and Meltzer point out
- as do several other contributors to this volume - of
romanticising the past. The District is then cast only
as a happy place, the people in it only as caring for one
another, with "even its rogues . . . represented as win
some Robin Hoods".105
Such nostalgic romanticism, these writers point out,
is helpful neither toward any rounded narrative of the
past nor toward the development of any insight that can
be carried into the future.
The Nature and Significance of Memory
Accounts of the District Six M u s e u m and its exhibitions
contain m a n y references to the significance of m e m o r y
and of " m e m o r y work", to "return" in the sense of bring
ing back the feelings and experiences of living in District
Six and leaving it.
Like people's o w n narratives, m e m o r y is seen as sig
nificant both as a way of overcoming the hurt of the
past and of building strengths and insights that will
productively shape the future. To achieve those efforts,
however, m e m o r y is seen as needing to take some par
ticular forms. Simply retrieving "facts", or indulging in
romantic nostalgia, is not enough. The role of art and of
m u s e u m s then lies in helping us retrieve and interpret
in ways that do more than this.
For the most explicit comments on m e m o r y and
" m e m o r y work", I turn to comments by Peggy Del-
port. She is not the only contributor to the District Six
M u s e u m to talk about memory . She is, however, the
one w h o makes the most explicit conceptual statements
about m e m o r y and aesthetics, as well as being the leader
of the curatorial group for several exhibitions. Hers are
the references, for example, to Marcuse on whether art
can change the world (p. 44), to Anthony Storr on the
nature and importance of historical m e m o r y (p. 42),
to Klima on the need to affirm "our c o m m o n h u m a n
ity" rather than our differences (p. 41), to Said on con
cepts of return as a way in which w e "restore ourselves
to ourselves" (p. 40), to A m o s O z on the defilement of
language (e.g. the misuse of terms such as "cleansing")
as a preliminary to the defilement of life and dignity (p.
39).106
These chapters are respectively titled "District Six: Representation and Struggle", and "Punc
tuations: Periodic Impressions of a Museum". Both are in Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S.,
ibid., respectively pp. 66- 73 and pages 74-95. Soudien was also a co-editor of a 1990 book
(S. Jappie and C . Soudien on The Struggle for District Six, noted by Rassool as now out of
print).
Soudien, C . and Meltzer, L. (2001) "District Six: Representation and Struggle". Op.cit., p.67.
7 ibid., p.70.
Prosalendis, S., Marot, J., Soudien, C . and Nagia, A . (2001) "Punctuations: Periodic Impres
sions of a Museum". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (Eds.) (2001 ) Op.cit. p.82
J ibid., p.84.
10 ibid., p.85.
Delport, P. (2001 ) "Signposts for Retrieval: a Visual Framework for Enabling Memory of
Place and Time". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis, S. (2001 ) Op.cit., p.41.
" Soudien, C . and Meltzer, L. (2001) "District Six: Representation and Struggle". Op.cit., p.68.
)3ibid.,p.69.
) 4 ibid., pp.68-69.
This phrase is from a further chapter with Soudien as an author: Soudien, C . (2001) "Hold
ing O n to the Past: Working with the Myths of District Six". In Rassool, C . and Prosalendis,
S. (Eds.) (2001) Op.cit, p.99.
The statements cited for Delport are from three chapters in the book edited by Rasool,
C . and Prosalendis, S.: Delport, P. (2001) "Museum Or Place For Working With Memory?"
pp. 11 -12.; "Signposts for Retrieval: A Visual Framework for Enabling Memory of Space and
Time" pp.31-46.; "Digging Deeper in District Six: Features and Interfaces in a Curatorial
Landscape" pp. 154-165. A m o n g the people involved in the District Six Museum, there are
others with strong conceptual orientations. Smith and Rassool, for example, have already
been noted in the comments on Digging Deeper. Delport, however, has a particular interest
in memory.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 125
From Delport's perspective, w h y do m e m o r y and
m e m o r y work matter? T w o reasons stand out:
"The recollection of painful past events is a precon
dition for achieving the culture of reconciliation"
(p.3i)-
" N o future is satisfactorily imagined without a
full and multi-faceted historical memory , to help us
explore our o w n identity, to discover h u m a n potenti
alities and to steer us away from destructive possibili
ties" (p. 42).
For such effects to occur, however, some barriers to
m e m o r y need to be taken into account. To start with:
"Collective m e m o r y ... remains vulnerable. Inhibited
by a political climate favouring the suppression of the
facts .. . the destruction of documentary records . . .
the willing amnesia of most of the white population
... a largely unrecorded and scattered history, and a
national impatience to m o v e away from the dark
times into a more hopeful future" (p. 36).
Blotting out effective m e m o r y are also the false framings
offered by terms such as "slum clearance" or " c o m m u
nity development" and the less-ready availability of other
terms to describe the full nature of what was lost and
what has remained at least in people's hearts.
H o w then is m e m o r y to be assisted? Here Delport
argues for the importance of "visual frameworks ...
enabling the m e m o r y of space and time". The floor m a p ,
for example, invites an actual walking through the Dis
trict, not simply looking at it. Its streets, and the walk
ing-through, represent and bring back the web of rela
tionships that was central to life in the district. In every
way possible, the lay-out of the m u s e u m is designed to
provide the "hooks" needed to assist the work of m e m
ory, to provide routes back into the past.
More is needed, however, than the retrieval of facts.
W h a t needs to occur are both the return of feeling and,
with it, the return of a sense of recovery, agency, and
firm resolve:
"Such collective recall has to be fostered actively ...
It . . . has to be gathered, m a d e available for inter
pretation and presented in ways that encourage its
acceptance and assimilation. This latter task is the
responsibility of practitioners in more than one dis
cipline" (p. 31).
For such steps to occur, Delport argues, there is a need
for "vehicles of retrieval outside the official commissions
of enquiry (that are) ... limited to the most serious cases
of abuse, such as torture and political murder" (p. 37).
These are not where all the hurt and the harm lie. A n d
these vehicles m a y allow the least room for individuals to
experience a sense of recovery, return, and resolve, and
to move forward. For that, one needs more to tap into
their individual sense of identity and place. Healing, she
argues, works "from the bottom up".
Does this m e a n then that benefit can only occur if
exhibitions engage individuals by placing their empha
sis on local places and local experiences? In Delport's
view, experiences of loss and of return through m e m o r y
work are not limited to a focus on District Six or even in
Africa. O n the contrary:
"The M u s e u m presents a simple example, perhaps a
pioneering one, of what could happen on a more
comprehensive front if the means of retrieval and
interpretation appropriate to similar contexts were to
be harnessed" (p. 37).
That hope could indeed present a challenge, especially
combined with Delport's view that museums must aim
first of all at engagement:
"The content of the M u s e u m is located not in what
is seen but in what happens within the space. Once
the M u s e u m stops being a live, generative space and
becomes an object to be consumed, merely looked
at and left behind untouched, its function as a liv
ing space will end. Its visual form would have turned
upon itself, and become unproductive and closed
It must above all stir the viewer into engagement
If appearance begins to be valued as being significant in
itself, and not as a means to uncover content, then the
process of individual growth and the work of extracting
and constructing meaning cannot begin Generated
by the engagement of the viewer through the avenue
126 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «< MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
of their o w n experience and perceptions ... provoked
within its landscapes, both its spaces and its fea
tures".107
Moving Forward
Cape T o w n offered the opportunity to consider sev
eral museums of the 'historic site' variety. A m o n g these,
several provided examples of moves toward undoing
the narratives that an established m u s e u m illustrates or
implies. Constantia's 'grand' farmhouse, the Bo-Kaap
M u s e u m , the old Slave Lodge and the Castle were the
examples chosen. All raised questions about what to
undo, h o w to undo it, and h o w to set priorities in the face
of m a n y calls for change. The m u s e u m chosen as a focus
for the second half of the chapter presented a different
kind of case. Here the site itself rather than the building
carried the meaning. A n available building could then be
adapted, not for the reconstruction of 'a house that was'
but for the reconstruction of memories and experiences
that were part of a destroyed area and disrupted lives.
Sydney also offers the possibility of looking at a
variety of historic houses. S o m e are like Constantia.
S o m e are closer to 'working-class' lives in the inner
city. S o m e - the house that once was a ' h o m e ' for
Aboriginal boys taken from their families is an exam
ple - are physical reminders of social injustice. O n e is
like the District Six M u s e u m , in the sense that there is
no physical reconstruction of 'a house that was'. Instead,
the goal is set as an evocation of the meanings of the
site. The m u s e u m in question is the M u s e u m of Sydney,
with its constant subtitle "on the site of the First Gover
nor's House".
Here again is a relatively n e w m u s e u m (it was estab
lished in 1995). Here again also is a record - in print -
of early contests and negotiations as to what the form
of the m u s e u m should be. Here as well is the aim of
engaging and involving visitors so that they both think
and feel rather than passively view or passively learn a
set of 'facts'. Here again is an awareness of the site as
one of dispossession and of the continuing presence of a
dispossessed people w h o were often thought of as
'disappearing' either physically or in significance. At
the same time, there are differences between the two
situations and the two outcomes that m e a n w e shall not
be simply repeating what has been learned from District
Six.
Time then to turn to the M u s e u m of Sydney, O n the
Site of the First Governor's House.
ibid, p. 159, emphasis added.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY \TJ
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CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 129
The Australian Museum
130 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
The South African M u s e u m (All South African photographs: Cecil Kortje)
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY I3I
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132 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
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CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °~ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 133
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136 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Hands That
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The Slave Lodge
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 137
138 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °* MUSEUMS ÏN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
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CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 139
top: Bag Carrier by Durant Sihlali (1984) bottom: Forces Favouritell by Gavin Younge (1997)
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140 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
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CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 141
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CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 143
CHAPTER 6
The Museum Of Sydney:
On The Site Of The First Government House
TH I S C H A P T E R C O N T I N U E S the concern with
historic sites and the decisions and negotiations
surrounding the stories and people they are to repre
sent. Like Cape Town, Sydney has its share of historic
sites and houses that tell stories about the colonial past.
This chapter, however, concentrates on one particular
m u s e u m . This is the M u s e u m of Sydney, opened in 1995,
and given a n a m e with a subtitle: O n the Site of the First
Government House.
W h a t is the m u s e u m likely to add to what has already
been learned? To introduce the answers to that question,
I return to a way of describing m u s e u m s and forms of
challenge or change that has been used in earlier chap
ters. This approach considers aspects of place, people,
practices, and meanings. Place refers to the physical fea
tures of a m u s e u m : its site, its buildings, the lay-out of
its exhibits. In the case of this m u s e u m , place refers also
to the value of the site for other purposes: purposes such
as commercial development. People refers to the several
stakeholders with an interest in the museum's collec
tions, displays, decision-making, and operation. They
range from government representatives to m u s e u m
staff, donors, tour guides, visitors ('old' or 'new' ) , and
representatives of the people often presented as part of
history. These groups bring with them a variety of agen
das and resources, and engage in a variety of alliances,
challenges and negotiations. Practices refers to the ways
of collecting, displaying or decision-making that have
come to be established and often to be seen as a 'natural'
part of museums . Meanings arise in conjunction with
places, people, or practices. Noted especially have been
perceptions and expectations (e.g., perceptions and
expectations of what m u s e u m s should be about and
what they can reasonably demand of visitors) and cat
egories of several kinds. Categories m a y be, for exam
ple, ways of dividing places (e.g., into 'child-oriented' or
'adult-oriented') or ways of dividing people (e.g., into
black and white, ancient and modern, expert or a m a
teur) . Challenges and changes m a y be related to any of
the visible features or - more directly - to the meanings
they convey.
Place and people - and their meanings - are the
features that stand out especially in relation to the
M u s e u m of Sydney. Place, for example, matters in ways
w e have not previously seen. N o existing building stood
on the site. Indeed, the historical significance of the
site was not a matter of public concern until a plan for
commercial development threatened to treat it like any
other downtown city space that the State government
could sell to developers. A n y m u s e u m on this site would
then be a 'new building'. Once agreed to, it would have
state funding. But what form should it take? Should an
authentic recreation of the first house be built? If not
(an early decision), what else could it be? If its intended
function was to evoke the past, to serve as a reminder
of h o w the city or the nation began, h o w could it do so
without the usual tangible signs, the remains of what
once was? Even the District Six M u s e u m , to take a point
144 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
from Chapter 5, had its evocative collection of street
signs, marking routes, journeys, and the places of work,
play, and living that were for m a n y people part of their
recent past experience. W h a t could convey narratives or
evoke feelings on a site that dated back to 1788?
People n o w come into play in several ways. There is
still a significant interplay between people representing
the m u s e u m - the m u s e u m staff and its Board - and rep
resentatives of Aboriginal groups. This time, however,
there is from the start an acknowledgment of Aboriginal
presence, past and continuing. There is as well a strong
attempt to have Aboriginals present their ' o w n narra
tives' in their ' o w n voices', and a marked move toward
presenting a differentiated picture of Aboriginals. They
are not simply a single 'other'. Instead, they are recog
nised as m a d e up of various groups, and - within these
groups - as individuals. The interesting questions then
become: H o w is the presence of diversity m a d e evident
for visitors? A n d , in the midst of all this acknowledg
ment, what tensions still remain?
Emerging more strongly than before is the presence
of diversity also within the set of people often described
simply as 'colonisers'. N o w , for example, marked con
test emerges between "Friends of the First Government
House" and the curatorial team. It emerges also across
disciplines, with archaeologists, historians, architects
and curators differing from one another. The debate
was not only lively. It was also well-documented, with
several positions expressed in full and with passion.
People also appear as significant in their place and
expectations as visitors. This is not a m u s e u m that can
count on an established group of visitors: people w h o
came, for instance, as children and w h o n o w return
with their children, or people w h o have come to regard
a visit to 'the m u s e u m ' or 'the gallery' as part of their
usual activities. Instead, this is a m u s e u m that has to
work harder to determine w h o its current and potential
visitors are and what they expect. It is also, as w e shall
see, a m u s e u m that has to take seriously audience resist
ance to some n e w forms of m u s e u m practice.
With this m u c h introduction, let m e note h o w the
chapter is structured. As in previous chapters, the first
section offers a brief visitor's eye view. The second sec
tion again looks at the background and initial phases
of planning for the m u s e u m . The third section consid
ers several exhibitions. These range from exhibitions
seen as successful by all parties involved, to exhibi
tions found 'too difficult' by some audiences and sub
sequently closed. They range also from exhibitions
that placed more emphasis on contemporary than on
historical Sydney and even one - chosen with a view
to attracting n e w audiences - that left the Sydney base
and featured an Australian cartoonist based in another
State.
The final section, as in previous chapters, takes up an
issue highlighted by a particular m u s e u m but relevant
to others. This is the issue of audiences, in the form of
h o w to match or change audience expectations, espe
cially when the audiences are multiple in nature. I focus
on three audiences that raise particular questions about
links between the museum ' s hopes and preferences and
those of its visitors or observers. These three are inter
national visitors, school groups and Aboriginal groups.
As in previous chapters also, the sources drawn upon
cover direct observation, printed text and interview
material. W h e n the text sources repeat interview points,
I have given preference to the text sources.1
A. A Visitor's Eye View
The m u s e u m is in a central city space, on the corner of
two busy streets, and only a couple of blocks back from
the Harbour. It is then easy to imagine that this could
be a site where Aboriginals and the incoming group first
saw each other. The m u s e u m is also in a section of the
city with a special shape and an odd architectural mix.
In shape, this section is framed at the base by a circular
cove that lies at the bottom of a sloping section of land.
The water here is deep but still, making it a prime land
ing space for the boats that m a d e up the First Fleet and
making it even n o w an optimal place for bringing in both
large ships and also the m a n y ferries that link one side of
the Harbour to another. In 1788 - the date for the arrival
of the first fleet - the area was reasonably wooded, but
the ground - then and n o w - was more stone than soil.
Architecturally, the mix is one of'old' and 'new'. O n
the one hand are buildings and spaces that say 'history'.
Here, for example, is the city's largest concentration of
'old' sandstone buildings (mostly Victorian in style).
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 145
Here also, on one major street a block distant from the
M u s e u m of Sydney are the sites of several other firsts:
the first barracks, mint, hospital, church, state library,
Parliament House. The barracks and the mint are n o w
m u s e u m s . The hospital, church, library, and Parliament
House still serve the same functions as the original
buildings on them once did. All of these buildings c o m
memorate parts of 'settler history'. None , for example,
commemorate Aboriginal culture or the people w h o
occupied the land at the time of the Fleet's arrival. At
the same time, this section of the city also houses a large
concentration of N e w York-style skyscrapers, completely
different from the heritage buildings in height, style,
age, function, and relation to the space they occupy. To
round out the mix, this section of the city also houses
Sydney's Opera House, built at the end of one of the two
arms of the small circular cove.
Overall, one can well see h o w this site could become
a place for a tug-of-war between people seeing its
value as an historical place and those seeing its value
as a commercial asset. Easy to imagine also is the gap
between those w h o see the skyscraper-style develop
ment as exciting and appropriate, and those w h o see it
as a deplorable mix and - at the least- as a loss of the
visual sweep up the city's slope that used to be gained
as one came by water into the cove. Easy to imagine
also is the difference between people w h o seek to keep
an emphasis on 'settler history' and those w h o see the
emphasis as one-sided, calling n o w for balance and a
recognition that here was a site with meanings for more
than one group.
The m u s e u m building itself is built at the back of
an open space on the street corners. The open space
is named "First Government House Place". This is a
square in which the perimeters of the original house are
marked by steel studs and varied paving stones (white
and grey granite, and sandstone), some exposed foot
ings of the house, and the sculptural installation Edge of
the Trees by Janet Laurence and Fiona Foley. This instal
lation includes 29 pillars made of w o o d and sandstone
with embedded speakers offering the voices of Aborigi
nal peoples from the area. These voices n a m e the flora
of the area, repeating words engraved into the pillars.
Entering the m u s e u m , a second soundscape is
offered in the glass entry hall - a "calling to come" or
"a conversation; a yearning to communicate across time,
place and cultures".2 This again uses more than one lan
guage (the conversation is primarily between a named
settler and a named Aboriginal - Dawes and Patyega-
rang). It sets the tone for the general atmosphere of
the m u s e u m as one that does not interpret and explain
but offers voices and fragmented histories. Within the
museum's main building, the entry offers glass-covered
excavations below the floor-surface, showing the origi
nal house's drains and privies (the guide m a p , both on
line and in the visitor brochure, asks whether these are
"relics, ruins, rubbish?"). The guide m a p also suggests
that the visitor look at the re-creation of one section of
the façade. It is labelled in a way that emphasises the
gap between what one sees and its meanings: "Confront
the re-creation of its humble façade: symbol of colonial
power".3 O n this floor also is Aboriginal artist Gordon
Syron's work Invasion 1 - An Aboriginal Perspective: a
painting which portrays the First Fleet as the arrival of
menacing ghost ships.
O n the second floor, above the staircase and vis
ible from the reception area, is a row of replicas of the
First Fleet with texts describing the different ships and
their contents. The ships were a gift to the M u s e u m and
stand out for their different treatment from objects
such as the recreated wall. Here the ships are allowed to
stand as 'authentic' recreations and unquestioned his
torical fact. Also visible from the first floor is a large
video wall showing "the scale and strangeness of Syd
ney's unique natural environment - sandstone, eucalypt,
harbour". (The use of "strange" is speaking from a set
tler's perspective). Next to the video wall is one of three
collectors' chests. These include items found at the site
juxtaposed with a variety of other items. Again there is
little interpretation but each drawer "tells its o w n story
through objects, words, and images" to the visitor w h o
is willing to spend time finding the connections and
deciphering the story.
Adjacent is a wall including objects found at the site
mixed with objects found at other sites in the region.
These represent various forms of work, toil and domes
tic life. This section of the m u s e u m is titled: European
Cultural Baggage. It was originally opposite a video
work by Aboriginal artist Michael Riley called Sydney
People, showing "a group of Sydney Aboriginal people
I46 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
retracing the steps of their ancestors through film and
sound, sites, memories, dreamings". The video work has
since been moved to a quieter position in a n e w visitors'
reading and research room. The accompanying video
for European Cultural Baggage offers a reconstruction
of conversations (carried out by actors in period dress)
of factual and fictional members of the settler society.
This is one of the tew acknowledgements of the breadth
of peoples within settler society, beyond the usually
emphasised English and Irish. (Also on the second floor
is a further recognition of multicultural Sydney through
a glassed wall showing trade items that came through
the port of Sydney).
The last item on this floor is a feature added after
the opening. This is a visitors' centre in which archives
and objects pertaining predominantly to settler society
m a y be explored through access to some of the m u s
eum's databases. This centre is also the " h o m e " of the
educational programs and is regularly filled with school
groups.
O n the third floor, space has been given over to tem
porary exhibitions. At the time of m y visit (in Febru
ary 2002), there were two exhibitions on show. O n e
was an exhibition of work by the cartoonist Michael
Leunig - an exhibition only loosely connected to the
site of Sydney but a popular choice. The other was On
Location: Sydney an exhibition featuring the city as a
location for films and fashion photography. More per
manent is a timeline for the city. This is presented by
way of a changing Sydney panorama, which focuses
"on the development of Sydney - changes to shore and
skyline, people and memory" . The main table near the
panorama offers a predominantly 'celebratory' view of
the city's growth. The drawers below offer more evi
dence of conflict and protest in the city's history.
Also on this floor are two kinds of spaces. O n e is a
lookout. This is a glass enclosure, in the shape of the
prow of a boat, which offers views of the contemporary
city. From this space the viewer can also see the layout
of the original house site. This is traced on the plaza in
front of the m u s e u m through the use of steel studs on
white granite.
The other kind of space on this floor is Cadigal Place,
devoted to local Aboriginal history. Here one can "con
template, honour, remember the history, culture and
survival of the original people of this land, this place.
Commemora t e the Cadigal people, the clan on whose
land the m u s e u m n o w stands". The central space here
is filled with a circle of fixed banners. Each is dedicated
to an Aboriginal w h o featured in early encounters with
the colonisers. Most of these were kidnapped by the
first governor, Governor Phillip, in an attempt to learn
the language of the local population. Others were resist
ance fighters such as Pemulway. T w o of the main walls
are given over to glass cabinets that include material
objects: shields, stone axes, and hunting and gathering
utensils. A further wall includes a video screen on which
stories by contemporary Aboriginals are told. These are
both stories about growing up in the area, and stories
passed d o w n to them by their parents and elders.
B. Backgrounds And Beginnings
T w o histories need to be noted: one for the site, and one
for the building. I begin with a brief history of the site.
The first Government House was built in 1788 for the
first British Governor, Phillip, on land belonging to the
Cadigal people. The house itself was demolished in 1846
when a new Government House was built at Bennelong
Point (now a site overlooking the Sydney Opera House).
A temporary building was erected on the site in 1912 and
demolished in 1968. The site was then covered with bitu
m e n and used as a car park. It remained, however, the
property of the state. In 1980:
"in an attempt to recognise the significance of the site,
several interest groups suggested that a replica of the
first Government House be built on the car park site.
Nothing came of this, apart from some public recog
nition of what had been previously there, and in 1982
the N e w South Wales Government called for propos
als for the development of the site. The successful
tenderer proposed a 38 level tower. The government
agreed that there should be an archaeological exca
vation prior to the construction. After a prelimi
nary archaeological dig the remains of the footings
of Phillip's 1788 house were uncovered in February
1983".4
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 147
Contest 1 : Archaeological Excavation
Anne Bickford, the Director of the excavations of the site,
describes briefly the different phases of the excavations:
"Excavations began at the ... site early in 1983 . . . .
Foundations of the back wall of Phillip's house and
other archaeological deposits were found in the first
exploratory trenches. Excavations continued on a
m u c h larger scale in 1983 and 1984. Foundations and
some other structures were left in situ, and eventu
ally it was decided to carefully backfill the site until
its future could be decided. Further limited excava
tions took place to delimit the extent of the remains
until 1990".5
The excavations aroused early public interest, both
because heritage issues in general were being underlined
by awareness that 1988 would be the bicentenary of the
First Fleet's arrival in Sydney, and because of a more spe
cific concern that a heritage site would be lost to c o m
mercial interests. To continue Bickford's account:
"In September 1983 there was a demonstration of
hundreds of people at Macquarie Place wanting to
allow time for the site to be properly excavated. At this
demonstration the Friends of the First Government
House Site was formed to exert force on the govern
ment to allow more time to excavate the whole of the
site properly before deciding its future. S o m e people
were agitating to save the remains of the site in situ
and not build over them at all".''
For the Friends and other groups, the site became an
issue of national identity - a fight to save colonial herit
age from the threat of overseas developers:
"I collected some posters from this demonstration . . .
They say "Wake up Heritage Council', 'Aussie History
Not H o n g Kong $' and similar things. The people w h o
were active in saving the site ... had diverse occupa
tions and interests and included most of the archae
ologists and volunteers on the dig, people active in
the National Trust of Australia, the Fellowship of
First Fleeters, the W o m e n ' s Pioneer Society . . . All
of them were united in their interest in archaeology
and conservation and in this symbol of our heritage
which was so important for us".7
At this point then, there was a c o m m o n agenda for the
several interested parties:
" N o w that this part of the dig has been over for more
than ten years, the campaign to save it might acquire
a certain romantic aura of its o w n . The point I want
to m a k e here . . . is that it wasn't just one of us, or one
group w h o saved the site; m a n y people contributed to
the pressure that the government felt".8
The public interest in turn put pressure on the govern
ment and the archaeologists working on the site:
"The site was excavated under tremendous pressure
by the government, which had already leased the site,
to finish the dig".9
" O n e of the initiatives which the government
undertook to hasten the dig, and m a k e it appear that
it was doing all that it could, was to second archaeol
ogists working in the public service, for Departments
such as the National Parks and Wildlife ... to work
on the excavation for three days a week".10
Otherwise, the government took a 'wait and see' attitude:
"Although there was often coverage of the controversy
over the fate of the remains in the media, the govern
ment remained silent on the matter until August 1983,
when the Premier, Neville W r a n , visited the site. In
his press interviews he was inconclusive, saying that
he had to weigh up the interests of conservation and
development and could not yet see a solution".11
Contest 2: A M u s e u m or an Office Building?
In the end, Bickford reports, a compromise was found:
"It was finally decided that the site would stay pre
served underground in an open plaza and that an
office building, Governor Phillip Tower, and a
I48 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
m u s e u m , the M u s e u m of Sydney, would be built at
the rear of the site. A window onto a small segment
of the 1788 footings was constructed in the plaza, n o w
called First Government House Place".12
Peter Watts, Director of the Historic Houses Trust of
N e w South Wales, offers details regarding the decision
and continued funding for the site and m u s e u m :
"By March 1988 the government was able to announce
a joint venture with several other adjoining o w n
ers and developers to include a huge redevelopment
of the entire city block on which the site of the first
Government House was located . . . The redevelop
ment was to include a small commemorative struc
ture on the site of the demolished house. The govern
ment sold, for $85 million, its development rights to
this land to the adjoining owners and allocated $20
million to a m u s e u m to be built as an integral part of
the redevelopment".13
Where, one might ask, were Aboriginal voices in all this
debate about saving the site and preserving colonial his
tory? Anne Bickford comments:
"The M u s e u m of Sydney has been criticised
recently by some groups for its 'political correct
ness' in emphasising the site's connections with the
Aboriginal history of the region. This should not be
seen as a n e w focus because, from the beginning of
the excavation 12 years ago, before even the phrase
'politically correct' was coined, I worked very hard to
involve Aboriginal people in the site. T w o Aboriginal
m e n joined the excavation, and the Principal of
the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, Eric
Wilmot, was interviewed on the site by A B C T V .
Wilmot, an Aboriginal, had just published a biogra
phy of the Aboriginal patriot Pemulwoy. H e saw First
Government House as a significant site for Aboriginal
people, for it was here that Pemulwoy met Governor
Phillip to attempt to negotiate the British presence on
Aboriginal land".14
Here then was one first sign of consultation and of the
early singling out - in this case by Wilmot - of individuals
within the Aboriginal 'mass'. (Pemulwoy is the resist
ance figure given a special place in the Cadigal Place
section of the M u s e u m ) .
Contest 3: What Kind of Museum?
Once the decision to create a m u s e u m was made , the
translation into action was turned over to the Historic
Houses Trust of N e w South Wales:
"In September of that bicentennial year (1988) the
Historic Houses Trust . . . was appointed by the
Minister for the Arts as the manager and developer of
the m u s e u m , thus enabling it to prepare a brief".15
Controversy did not end there. The brief turned out to
be more difficult to write than expected. There were
clearly divided opinions as to what a m u s e u m on this
contested site should be:
"The architect's proposal for the m u s e u m suggested
an open court in front of a m u s e u m ... The forecourt
was to be dominated by a huge figurative sculpture
of Governor Phillip . . . Archaeologists, architects
For interview time, I a m especially indebted to Fabienne Virago, education officer at the M O S .
The main written texts are: Seminar transcripts - (2001) Allowan - I Remain: In Search of
Sydney's Aboriginal Cultural Heritage. Sydney: Historic Houses Trust of N e w South Wales;
and Hunt, S. (Ed. I (1996) Sites - Nailing the Debate: Archaeology and Interpretation in Muse
ums. Sydney: Historic Houses Trust of N e w South Wales;
Books - Carter, P. (1999) Lost Subjects. Sydney: Historic Houses Trust of N e w South Wales;
Dhysart, D . (Ed. ) (2000) Edge of the Trees at the Museum of Sydney. Sydney: Historic Houses
Trust of N e w South Wales; Gibson, R . (Ed.) (1996) Exchanges: Cross-cultural Encounters
in Australia and the Pacific. Sydney: Historic Houses Trust of N e w South Wales; Gibson, R .
(1996) The Bond Store Tales. Sydney: Historic Houses Trust of N e w South Wales; lournal
articles - Bovers Ball, P. ( 1997} "Australian Report: The M u s e u m of Sydney - on the Site of
First Government House" pp.5-8. In US/ICOMOS no.2, March-April 1997.
" www.hht.nsw.gov.au/mediaroom/propertyguide/guide_mos.html.
This and the next few quotes are from the M u s e u m of Sydney guide.
4 Watts, P. (2000) "The Making of a Museum" . In Dhysart, D . (2000) Op.cit., p. 16.
5 Bickford, A . (2000) "The Archaeological Project 1983-1990". In Hunt, Susan (Ed.) (1996)
Op.cit., p.66.
6 ibid., p.69.
' ibid., pp.69-70.
8ibid.,pp.71-72.
9 ibid., p.69.
ibid., p.70.
ibid.,p.71.
ibid., p.72.
10
Watts, P. (2000) Op.cit. p.16.
ibid., pp.72-73.
ibid.,p.l6.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "•» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY I49
and urban planners all had their o w n agendas. Those
that had saved the site from development felt they
had a strong claim on the future direction of the
project. The politicians w h o provided the funding
also had views, and were keen to express them. So
did the historians - though they varied widely. The
Aboriginal community naturally held views about
this place. They were diametrically opposed to those
of the descendants of the British settlers. It was con
tested ground w h e n the First Fleet arrived in 1788 and
Governor Phillip erected his house on this place, and
it was n o w contested ground over the meaning of the
place".16
Peter Emmett , Senior Curator of the M u s e u m from 1988,
offers a more detailed description of the key players and
the contention regarding the m u s e u m plans:
"Enter the archaeologists w h o spent ten years excavat
ing the foundations of the demolished house accord
ing to an 1844 plan. Their Statement of Significance,
identifying important features of the site, was a litany
of 17 'firsts': first governors, settlers, printing press,
building, kitchen, stable, staircase, cellar, garden
... Wait, it gets more preposterous: first area cleared,
first important people, first government discussions,
first historic events. Ruins conjure up such absurd
notions of origins".17
"Enter the Friends of First Government House w h o
were instrumental in saving the site. To the Friends,
though, the founding father was not Phillip but
James Bloodworth, the convict bricklayer w h o built
the house. There are m a n y bricks in the m u s e u m col
lection as his memorial. Enter the N e w South Wales
Aboriginal Land Council, for they have a special
interest in those bricks too. Does the mortar using
shell from middens contain the bones of Eora dead?
Enter the N e w South Wales Heritage Council, w h o
declare the site so significant that it must be covered
with concrete. A n d so enter the n e w developers, the
State Superannuation Board. 'Our founding father
was a clairvoyant' blazons the promotion for their
n e w Governor Phillip Tower, because he foresaw, in
the words of Erasmus Darwin, 'tall spires, and d o m e -
capt towers ascend' ".18
"Enter the architects, Denton Corker Marshall, to
design a modern facility to commemorate the place
- a beautiful, classical building, consistent with the
Enlightenment aspirations of the European colonis
ers; complete with bronze stature of Phillip, in found
ing father pose, and a row of flagpoles as entry to the
museum" . "
Peter Watts, Director of the Historic Houses Trust,
describes the dilemma that this created for the Trust:
" H o w was the Trust to deal with these views? W h a t
sort of m u s e u m was appropriate? It challenged us
for several years ... W e ... produced a ' m u s e u m plan'
in which w e defined the significance of the place as
being its symbolic value - as the place that was the
focus of the great turning point in the history of this
continent that occurred there on 26 January 1788. It
was a bold point of view - not what everyone expected,
or wanted".20
The adoption of some general principles
The m u s e u m plan developed by the Trust made it clear
that the site could not be only celebratory. It also had to
acknowledge the variety of meanings the site held for
different people:
"The most potent and provocative significance
of First Government House site is as a symbol of
British colonisation of Australia in 1788 and its sub
sequent role as the seat of British authority in the
colony. To Australians in the 1990s this symbolism
will m e a n different things to different people. Hence
First Government House site becomes a symbol of
different perspectives on h o w w e see ourselves as
Australians today".21
The m u s e u m would also be about the issues "surround
ing the place, rather than specifically the place itself".22
That m o v e towards the symbolism of the place rather
than the site itself raised m a n y objections, particularly by
those w h o had fought to save it.
Tracey Ireland, archaeologist with the Department of
Planning, Heritage Division, comments that this move
150 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
"immediately alienated the Friends of First Government
House".23 The Friends prepared a counter-statement
protesting the plans of the Trust:
"The foundations of Government House were laid in
the same year as the foundation of the nation n o w
k n o w n as the Commonwea l th of Australia. They are
the only k n o w n remains from 1788. The life of this
building and its additions thus co-exist with the
Convict Era of Australian history. As such it repre
sents a tangible record of continuous occupation
and development not only of the formation years of
Australia but also of the broader concerns of colo
nialism and imperialism in the nineteenth century.
These tangible links, the very foundation of a nation,
are unique".24
The Friends' disgruntlement with the Trust's plans for the
m u s e u m increased with a change in n a m e and changes
in original plans:
"As the Friends continued to focus on the celebration
of the founding of the nation, the Trust moved fur
ther away from this position. In 1993 the n a m e of the
m u s e u m was changed to the ' M u s e u m of Sydney on
the site of first Government House' . . . This enraged
the Friends w h o saw this departure as 'fraudulent'
and 'deceitful' ... The Trust also abandoned a pro
posed monumental stature of Governor Phillip and
in its place commissioned a contemporary instal
lation designed and executed by two w o m e n art
ists ... Further statements by the Trust show that its
focus on the issues of contact has strengthened. At a
recent seminar the M u s e u m ' s Curator of Indigenous
Australian Studies, David Prosser, stated that for
m a n y people the Museum of Sydney would be an intro
duction to the cultural values of Aboriginal people' '.25
S o m e of the outrage was expressed through the media,
both by way of editorials and letters to the editor:
" H a d the $27 million allocated for an interpretation
centre at the First Government House been used for
that purpose, w e might have been able to extend our
knowledge of those first sixty years of the growth of
modern Australia. Instead, it seems the change of
n a m e to the inappropriate M u s e u m of Sydney will
be accompanied by a focus on more contemporary
issues like M a b o , the republic, etc., rather than illus
trating h o w Europeans survived before sliced bread
and the Water Board".26
The moves by the Trust upset others beyond the Friends
of First Government House:
" A m o n g the community of heritage professionals,
some with a long involvement in the conservation of
this site, there is some bitterness about the way the
Trust has m a d e decisions about the interpretation
of this site. The conservation of this site is seen as a
unique community initiative and there is a feeling
that this has been overlooked".27
In Ireland's view, the Trust's decision to concentrate on
the theme of contact was a loss also to public under
standing of the processes of archaeology:
"To m a n y archaeologists First Government House
was a critical turning point for public archaeology.
It represented a longed-for opportunity to introduce
the public to n e w ways of looking at history, of ques
tioning the evidence and showing h o w ideas about
the past are constructed".28
For archaeologists, that opportunity was clearly felt to be
lost.
ibid., pp.16-17.
' ' Emmet t , P. (2000) " W h a t Is This Place?" In Dhysart, D . (Ed.) (2000) Op.cit, p.22.
18ibid..p.22.
1 9 ibid., p.22.
20ibid.,p.l7.
Historic Houses Trust cited by Ireland, T In Hunt , Susan (Ed.) (1996) Op.cit., p.100.
" ' Ireland, T (1996) "Excavating National Identity". In Hunt, Susan (Ed.) ( 1996) Op.cit, p.100.
Emphasis added.
2 3 ibid., p.100.
2 4 Cited by Ireland, ibid., p. 100.
ibid., p. 100. Emphasis added.
Letter to The Sydney Morning Herald, November 1994. Cited by Jill Sykes in The View: Syd
ney, p.53.
2 7 Ireland, T. (2000) Op.cit., p.101.
28ibid.,p.l01.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 151
A view from the Curator
Peter Emmet t - the museum's Senior Curator - has m a d e
explicit both what he thinks the M u s e u m should be and
should notbe:
• "It's not an archaeology site". Nor is it "a house
m u s e u m ; the house doesn't exist".29
• It should not be "a ghost house": "Just h o w far can you
go hanging a m u s e u m around the neck of a building
that doesn't exist?"30
• It's "not a staged diorama history .. . It's not a dead
past, a once-upon-a-time in national fancy dress".31
• It's not a simplified history: " W h y do w e m a k e our
national history so simple? It was so exciting, complex,
colourful, poetic and brutal - like us still".32
W h a t were the alternatives? The emphasis came d o w n on
plurality, contest, the significance of place, and the theme
of contact. More fully:
• "(W)hat is this place? After m u c h debate and
bewilderment I realised that the answer was in
the question itself. This place is contested ground;
contested then, and contested still, for the right to be
in this place and for the favoured version of national
origins".33
• " W e can't really talk meaningfully about 'the site', for
it means different things to different people. There are
m a n y sites hovering here; different histories, journeys,
stories that cross and groove and m a k e this place w e
call Sydney".34
• "The symbolism of the site is . . . contact - the turning
point of colonisation/invasion of this patch of land
(Sydney). This contact, between Eora and European,
on this contested ground is . . . our starting point, our
local and spatial focus".35
• The essential task is then one of evoking the meanings
of the place, its "divergent emotional associations".36
The way to do that is not by way of the traditional
m u s e u m . Instead:
"Its meanings are revealed through the physical expe
rience of moving through it . . . our role on this 14-
year project is different to the archaeologist on the
152 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION « MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N A
dig, the historian writing books, the architect docu
menting construction, the public servant composing
cultural policies ... our m e d i u m and methodology
is about the poetics of space, the choreography of
people, the relation of things and senses, spatial and
sensory compositions, to exploit the sensuality and
materiality of the m u s e u m medium". 3 7
To bring out h o w those several intentions were translated
into practice, and received, I turn to several specific fea
tures and exhibitions and to their reception.
C . Growth, Exhibitions, A n d
Continued Contests
Since its opening in 1995, the M u s e u m of Sydney has
developed in a variety of ways. I single out five features
with implications for any m u s e u m that begins with goals
like those of this m u s e u m : goals that include the wish to
present a different view of history, concentrate on the
meanings of a place and 'the metaphor of space', focus
on the visitor's experience rather than on interpretation
and the delivery of fact, use sound and image more than
catalogued objects. The lines of development to be sin
gled out are ways of translating the ethos into practice.
They bring out also the varying levels of understanding
and enthusiasm with which the translations were met by
several audiences.
The five aspects fall essentially into two sets. In the
first are 3 permanent parts of the m u s e u m . O f these,
one is the large sculptural installation in the public
plaza outside the entrance to the building (The Edge
of the Trees: officially opened in 1995). The second is
the large room k n o w n as the Cadigal Place Gallery (or
simply Cadigal Place: opened in 1999). (The Cadigals
were the Aboriginal group occupying the land that
became the site for the first Government House and the
M u s e u m ) . Both of these features focus on the theme of
'first contact' and both aim at representing local A b o
riginal as well as settler experience. The third feature
consists of two contrasting collections of objects. O n e
is a set of uninterpreted fragments presented in "col
lectors' boxes", part of European Cultural Baggage. The
other is a conventional set of replicas of the ships in The
ND SYDNEY
First Fleet, presented to the m u s e u m .
The second set covers less permanent displays. T w o of
these focus on Sydney as a city, but without the empha
sis on 'first contact' and on Aboriginal issues. O n e con
sisted of a series of "presentations" with "music, film,
and pictures" showcasing in turn several of Sydney's
cultural groups (e.g., Chinese, Vietnamese, K h m e r : 1999-
2000). The other (On Location: Sydney) features Sydney
as a site in film and in fashion photography (2002). The
third moved away from Sydney, presenting instead the
work of an Australian cartoonist (Leunig) w h o is based
in another State, but whose cartoons are published in
the newspapers of several cities, Sydney included.
Feature 1: The Edge of the Trees
For many, this installation m a y be all that they see of
the m u s e u m . Highly visible, it is set in the plaza that
forms the corner of two busy streets and that contains
the attractive outdoor tables of the museum's restaurant.
As noted earlier, the installation is m a d e up of a set of
pillars created in various materials - wood , metal, stone.
N a m e s of places are engraved in the work along with
objects - hair, shells, and bones. The work is the result of
a collaboration between an Aboriginal artist, Fiona Foley,
and an artist of European descent, Janet Laurence. It has
been widely praised and is, by all parties involved, con
sidered a success.
W h a t makes the installation successful? Part of the
success stems from a sense of relief at being presented
with something more interesting than a conventional
statue. The initial plan, Peter E m m e t t writes, was for
something far more conventional: " w e had to subvert
the ... imperial grid" with its "giant statue of Phillip
(the first governor) and the row of flagpoles".38 Instead,
the brief sent out to several artists for proposals was
for something that would mark the area "as a shared
and contested site .. . alive, resonating with ghosts and
demons, hopes and dreams, not settled at all".39 The
title for the sculpture, Emmet t notes, comes from a
description of a first m o m e n t by Rhys Jones:
"the discoverers struggling through the surf were met
on the beaches by other people looking at them from
the edges of the trees. Thus the same landscape per
ceived by the newcomers as alien, hostile or having
no coherent form, was to the indigenous people their
h o m e , a familiar place, the inspiration of dreams".40
For those on the committee reviewing the submissions,
the proposal from Laurence and Foley best expressed the
emphasis in the brief on space as "culturally determined"
and as marked by the way "the journeys of people/cul
tures .. . groove the landscape, create borderlands and
meet, converge, become entangled".41 Here would be an
installation with an historical sweep and a recognition of
both place and people:
"The work, reminiscent of a forest of trees, was to
consist of a group of glass, zinc, steel and w o o d pil
lars scaled to relate to the wall of terraces behind,
with the tallest one being nine metres high. The
glass pillars would contain substances evocative of
Aboriginal presence at the site - honey, shells from
midden sites, ash - ephemeral materials which speak
of an Aboriginal way of life and culture. The choice
of material for the other columns was also intended
to reference the site in some way - w o o d recalling the
grove of stone pines which once grew there; sand
stone - the geology of the Sydney area and the 19 th
century buildings, which are an important feature
of the urban environment; steel and zinc - the m o d
ern city, and, in particular, the adjacent Governor
Phillip Tower. The arrangement of the columns was
determined by a ground m a p echoing the Sydney
Aboriginal groupings".42
" Emmet t , P. (1996) " W Y S I W Y G on the Site of First Government House". In Hunt . Susan
(Ed.)(1996)0p.cit.,p.ll2.
3 0 E m m e t t cited by Bovers Ball, P. ( 1997) In US/ICOMOS. Op.cit, p.5.
3 1 Emmet t , P. (1996) Op.cit., pp.111-112.
3 2 ibid., p. 112.
3 3 Emmet t , P (2000) Op.cit., pp.22-23.
3 4 ibid., p. 116.
3 5 Emmet t , P. (2000 ) "Concept Brief". In Dhysart, D . ( 2000) Op.cit, p.34.
3 6 Emmet t , P. ( 1996) Op.cit., p.112.
3 7 ibid., p.115
3 8 Emmet t , P. (2000) Op.cit, p.23.
3 9 .bid. 40
Jones, R . (1985) "Ordering the Landscape". In Donaldson, I. and T. ( 19S5) Seeing the First
Australians. Sydney: Allen and Unwin , p. 185. Cited in Emmet t , P. (2000) Op.cit., p.22.
4 1 Emmet t , P. (2000) Op.cit., p.36.
4 2 Dhysart, D . (2000) Op.cit., p.52.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY I53
Contributing to the installation's success was also its abil
ity to evoke a range of meanings and feelings in several
audiences. To start with, the work was positively m e a n
ingful to Aboriginals. To quote the comments of some of
those involved:
• "Lofty and proud, I think of the work as a memorial to
one language group of Indigenous people - the
Eora".43
• "I think the collaborative nature of Edge of the Trees,
the fact that it has something to say to all Australians,
is what makes it important. It is clearly a recognition of
the first peoples of this country and w e need symbols
like this in every town in the country because they will
remind us of a story that is struggling to be heard. I
think that w e must recognise that you can't draw a line
in the sand and say let's forget the past - w h y on earth
would a country want to forget its past - but w e must
have this melding of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal
history. It is symbolic of not allowing the stories to
be forgotten, of taking Indigenous issues and issues
of reconciliation and collaboration from the margins
and making them a significant part of the public life
of every city and town in Australia. Edge of the Trees
is a model. The collaborative nature of the project,
although at times a rocky one, has nevertheless been
worthwhile".44
• "For m e as an Aboriginal person, it represented our
history - the untold history .. . The sculpture is not
only informative but empowering, especially for
Indigenous Australians. This is emphasised by the
inclusion of the names of the 'warriors of the first
people of the Sydney area' - people such as Pemulway,
Tedbury and Patya - as well as the 'warriors of the first
fleet'. Until n o w these revered ancestors have been
virtually excluded from Australian history lessons,
or if they are mentioned they are given cursory
acknowledgement".45
For David Prosser - the Museum's Director of Aboriginal
Studies - a further attractive feature was the way the tall,
slender pillars resembled Aboriginal burial poles. With
those n o w established in the minds of all viewers as an
Aboriginal icon, the tall slender pillars were an instant
reminder of an Aboriginal presence.
The appeal, however, was also to non-Aboriginal
viewers. There is, Janet Laurence notes, an immediate
appeal to the passer-by:
"Without really looking at the work, I a m very aware
of its presence and the gravitational pull for people
into the space. I see them leaning in and listening
- and looking up and reading, connecting to it and
moving through".46
A further part of the appeal is the evocation of a tension
between "culture and nature". To use Laurence's words
again:
"The very fact that the wooden posts were recycled
back into the ground from which they were originally
felled fulfilled m y desire to create an urban forest
within which is housed layers of m e m o r y and m e a n
ing. At the same time Edge of the Trees expresses the
threatened relationship between culture and nature
and a disturbed environment, the trees themselves
'bearing the weight of regret and offering us signs of
hope' ",47
W a s everyone then pleased? Not surprisingly, some felt
marginalised by the concentration on first encounters
between Aboriginals and settlers:
" O n 26 January 1995, First Government House
Place and the sculpture The Edge of the Trees was
launched. There were m a n y Aboriginal people at the
ceremony and children performed an Aboriginal-
inspired dance. At the same time the Friends of First
Government House Site protested quietly. As the poli
ticians spoke, a male voice called out ' W h a t about the
convicts?'. S o m e groups obviously see the interpreta
tion of this site as an abandonment of traditional val
ues in an attempt at political correctness. In fact they
see it as an attack on their identities as Australians".48
Feature 2: Cadigal Place Gallery
The Edge of the Trees was one form of inclusion of A b o
riginal voices. It underlined Aboriginal presence in the
heart of the city - a presence otherwise easily overlooked.
154 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
It also began to differentiate among Aboriginals, noting
the presence of particular groups such as the Eora and of
particular named individuals.
The story told by the installation, however, was subtle
for the broader audience. Even though warrior names
were engraved on the poles, for example, there was no
description of w h o they were for audiences without his
torical knowledge of the peoples, clans and resistance
figures in the area. This subtle form of story-telling was
deliberate. So also was the focus on a time of first con
tact.
A shift to more explicit story-telling and to contem
porary Aboriginal voices and experience appears in 1999.
September 1999 marked the opening of a section n a m e d
the Cadigal Place Gallery, accompanied by an exhibi
tion that ran until December 2000. The Bamaradbanga
exhibition (the term means to "make open") included a
travelling exhibition - Unhinged: the Yeundumu Doors
- and a series of seminars including predominantly A b o
riginal voices: Allowan -1 remain: In Search of Sydney's
Aboriginal Cultural Heritage. The Cadigal Place Gallery
became a permanent gallery after the broader exhibi
tion was closed.
I shall concentrate on the Cadigal Place Gallery. T w o
aspects of the accompanying exhibition, however, call
for brief comment . Both point to some further ways
in which Aboriginal voices were being brought into
the m u s e u m . O n e was the invitation to descendants
of Sydney's Aboriginal groups to be part of dedicat
ing the Cadigal Place Gallery and, a week later, to open
the exhibition. Peter Watts, Chairman of the Historic
Houses Trust, comments that:
"Politicians and others tend to judge m u s e u m s by the
numbers w h o attend. I claim that the four Aboriginal
Elders w h o joined in to welcome guests at the opening
of the Bamaradbanga are just as important a measure,
showing an institution encouraging and embracing a
more tolerant and civilised society".49
The other aspect to the opening exhibition was the ini
tiation of a series of seminars:
"The Allowan - I remain seminars . . . have been sig
nificant events bringing together unique panels of
mostly Aboriginal speakers focusing on a wide range
of issues. From Native Title, the protection of cultural
heritage, the role of traditional owners, language and
cultural protocols to the interpretation and expres
sion of Sydney Aboriginal culture in personal and lit
erary stories, the papers ... are a lasting record of the
open and stimulating sharing of ideas".50
To return to Cadigal Place itself, the gallery is physically
one large room, with exhibits set into the wall and into
columns at the centre of the room. It offers both a selec
tion of objects of material culture as well as a selection
of personal stories describing first encounters and later
reminiscences.
The objects are weapons and tools that were used by the
local people. Displayed in glass cases with little text, they
can be understood in different ways. Fabienne Virago, in
her educational programs with children, focuses on h o w
the stone axes and spears exhibited were predominantly
used for gathering. The emphasis on food is an attempt
to counterbalance other possible interpretations of vio
lent primitives. For other visitors, these objects m a y sup
port the argument that Aboriginal people did put up a
fight against the settlers.
The early personal stories include the story of Pemul-
way (sometimes referred to as Pemulwoy). This is the
resistance figure singled out also for mention on the pil
lars of Edge of the Trees. Most of these early stories, h o w
ever, are about attempts at communication. Three of
Foley, E 12000) "Last Words from the Artists". In Dhysart, D . (2000) Op.cit, p.102. 14
Burney, L. (2000) "The Story of Sydney". In Dhysart, D . (2000) Op.cit, p.12.
David Prosser, the Museum's Director of Aboriginal Studies, (2000) "Last Words from the
Protagonists". In Dhysart, D . (2000) Op.cit., pp.97-98.
16 Lawrence, J. (2000) "Last Words from the Artists". In Dhysart, D . (2000) Op.cit, p.101.
' ibid. In the final sentence Lawrence cites Julie Roberts.
18 Ireland, T. (1996) Op.cit., pp.101-102.
Watts, P. in Insites Newsletter of the Historic Houses Trust of N e w South Wales, Issue 21,
Summer 1999, p.l. As mentioned in the opening of this chapter, however, Aboriginal
presence is not present in houses other than the two mentioned by Watts, and no historic
buildings directly related to Aboriginal history are included in the Trust's brief. There are
buildings in Sydney's Redfern or La Perouse suburbs that could be considered as important
historical sites within Aboriginal history during the past 200 years. Some buildings of im
portance are listed in the book published by Aboriginal Studies Press in 2001 - Aboriginal
Sydney (compiled by Hinkson, M . ) These include the Australian Hall and Yarra Bay House.
These two buildings are under Aboriginal administration and house a variety of c o m m u
nity activities and Aboriginal governance.
Allowan I Remain seminar transcripts, Op.cit, p.l.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY I55
the individuals singled out, for example, are Arabanoo,
Colebee, and Bennelong. All three were kidnapped on
the instructions of Governor Phillip, and the Resource
Kit cites his interest in verbal contact:
"It was absolutely necessary that w e should attain their
language and teach them ours (to show) the m a n y
advantages they would enjoy mixing with us."
"The natives still refuse to come amongst us. I
doubt whether it will be possible to get any of these
people to remain with us, in order to get their lan
guage, without using force".51
Phillip would clearly have anticipated benefits for both
groups. The colony was in dire need of fresh food and
water. The first attempts at growing food had failed, and
the colonists did not k n o w which native foods were edi
ble or where to find sufficient drinking water.
Arabanoo was the first to be captured. " H e was
brought to the Governor's house, and manacled until
April 1789, when he was 'deemed to be reconciled to his
fate' and freed to wander about the settlement at will."
Arabanoo died a year later in M a y 1789 from smallpox.
Six months later Governor Phillip issued a directive that
other natives should be captured: These were Colebee
and Bennelong. Both survived.
These Resource Kit descriptions of communication
attempts m a y seem one-dimensionally benign. There
are references to smallpox but none to violence or bru
tality directed against Aborigines. Even the Aboriginal
Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Stud
ies, however, in its description of the M u s e u m of Sydney
and the Cadigal Gallery, agrees that Phillip was well-
intentioned:
"For most of his time as Governor, Phillip was c o m
mitted to a conciliatory approach towards the
Indigenous population, and m a n y Aboriginal people
had access to his house. From eye witness accounts
it seems they felt comfortable there. Watkin Tench
describes Bennelong, returning after an absence,
'running from room to room with his companions'.
Aboriginal w o m e n came to seek refuge from vio
lent husbands and receive medical treatment from
Surgeon White. A number of Phillip's Aboriginal
companions, including Arabanoo and Baluderri,
were buried in his garden".52
The second set of stories - contemporary stories - are
from descendants of Aboriginal clans that were in the
Sydney area. These stories make it clear that the origi
nal owners of the land have not simply faded away. O n
video screens, their descendants re-tell stories, passed
on to them, about h o w life was lived in this area in past
times. They also tell current or recent stories about their
families and the experiences of growing up as Aboriginal.
The emphasis is on h o m e and family rather than on trag
edy. For visitors w h o tend not to see Aboriginals as part
of the Sydney scene or the Sydney population, these sto
ries are enlightening. They meet well the aims of David
Prosser:
"The three concepts that I adopted on m y employment
at the m u s e u m as Curator of Aboriginal Studies were
acknowledgement of the Darug people of Sydney;
acknowledgement of Aboriginal presence in Sydney
and acknowledgement of Aboriginality in Australia
today. These concepts rapidly became the principal
theme for all m y displays throughout the museum". 5 3
A m o n g the story-tellers themselves, there appears as well
an acceptance of the need to inform the non-Aboriginal
population. In the words of one of the Aboriginals at an
Allowan -1 remain seminars:
"I think it has only been in the last 10, 15 or maybe
20 years, and I speak from m y mother's point of view,
that some Aboriginal people have decided that white
people are not going to go away, but they don't k n o w
anything about us and unless w e tell them then they
are still going to treat us the way they have for the last
200 years. In m y family, one elder decided it was time
to teach white people about our heritage, and that
m a d e it a responsibility for the whole family".54
That comment underlines another facet to the concept of
'consultation' that m a y easily be overlooked. Invitations
to contribute are not necessarily welcome or accepted.
156 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Feature 3: Objects - Cultural Baggage and
Ship Replicas
For Emmett , the "museum's focus is not on objects. The
focus is on the ideas that the colony was grappling with
- the nature of government, nationalism, land ownership,
which relate to today's themes - republicanism, Native
Title, the connection to Britain and the awareness of
Asia".55
The museum' s focus is also on the visitor experienc
ing and constructing meaning rather than having inter
pretations provided.
W h a t then is the actual place of objects in the
m u s e u m ? They appear in two quite different forms: in
the section labelled European Cultural Baggage and in
the set of replicas - reduced in size - of the ships of the
First Fleet. Both m a y be regarded as more the result of
'gifts' to the M u s e u m than the result of efforts to collect.
The styles of display in the two areas are, however, quite
different from one another and the divergent interests
of various stakeholders are visible in each.
European Cultural Baggage. This section includes a
wall-display (sometimes referred to as the Sites display)
and three collectors' chests. The collectors' chests include
a variety of objects juxtaposed with text, graphics and
maps. These items are not presented with the usual cat
egorisation and grouping of like objects. Visitors are
encouraged instead to seek out the stories inherent in
the juxtapositions:
"Everything is a bit like a Pandora's box of looking
behind the object to find the people and their sto
ries. This 'releases the demons ' to talk about h u m a n
things. It is quite emotive so that you don't need an
expert to explain it".56
The wall-display includes a back-lit screen. Here a split-
screen effect allows conversations between real and fic
tional characters from a broad selection of people w h o
m a y have lived in Sydney and its surrounds during the
late 1700's.
The wall also includes objects from domestic and
work life. It is particularly these objects, some of which
came from the dig, that are the source of further protest
from the archaeologists. Their comments range from
"this borders on the criminal" to this being a misunder
standing of archaeologists' approach to the display of
objects. Professor Mulvaney:
"In the Sites window, artefacts are taken from sites
all over town, from anywhere at anytime in the 19th
century. They are not documented or distinguished.
This verges on the criminal. The earliest evidence of
European occupation has been dispersed".57
This objection is the same as that offered to the recon
struction of the front of the first government house in
the foyer. That reconstruction "uses bricks from the site
in conjunction with others gotten from other places.
They aren't separated out or labelled. This is in violation
of the Venice and Burra charters".58
"All these things relate to the view that there is no
value in evidence .. . At the M O S , there is no list of
governors, no chronology, no discussion of the his
tory of the house and h o w the governors changed it.
This is the equivalent of discussing American his
tory, but refusing to n a m e or list the presidents. The
m u s e u m is a fossil of the postmodern approach to
museology, and should be labelled as such".59
Emmett's reply regarding w h y he has not followed the
approach of archaeologists starts from his understand
ing of the practices of the discipline:
"archaeology is a paradoxical paradigm for a m u s e u m .
It peels back the contours of place and exposes,
destroying as it goes the relation between things,
the intimacy of marks and imprints. W h e n you
M u s e u m of Sydney Resource Kit, p.5.
52ibid.,p.l5.
5 3 Prosser, D . (2000) "LastWords". In Dhysart, D . (Ed.) (2000) Op.cit, p.97.
54
Allowan -1 remain seminar transcripts, Op.cit, p.4.
5 5 Emmet t cited by Bovers Ball, P. (1997) Op.cit., p.8.
Emmet t cited by Sykes, J. ( 1996) " O n the Edge of the Trees and Controversy: The N e w and
Revealing M u s e u m of Sydney". In The View: Sydney, p.52.
7 Mulvaney is cited by Bovers Ball, P. ( 1997) Op.cit., p.7.
ibid., p . / .
5 9 ibid., p.7.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 157
look through the cyclone fence at the archaeologists
methodically gridding and documenting, you are
beguiled, for w h e n you join them on the dig it's quite
different. They're excited by what they see, touch,
smell... But w h e n the dig is done - covered up - they
stop wondering. After whipping up all this excite
ment and wonderment they become boring, myopic.
They sift and sort fragments into taxonomies of types
and declare each significant. Clusters and assem
blages, once used in relation above ground .. . are
deconstructed into significant relics, each with n a m e ,
number and physical description of itself".60
Tracey Ireland counters that archaeologists' approach
to the display of objects needs to be better understood.
They do k n o w that objects have meaning:
"To an archaeologist, Peter Emmett 's conundrums are
essentially museological and not emanating from the
place itself or the nature of archaeology. While the act
of excavation is a public, theatrical experience which
offers viewers a connection with the past, archaeo
logical analysis is an interpretation of past environ
ments and people, actions and processes".61
Is there any resolution to such contests? There clearly
remain differences in intent. O n e step toward resolution,
however, is the creation of a Visitor's Centre that makes
stronger reference to the archaeological dig. Here c o m
puters are available for searches. The initiative for these
searches, however, still rests with the visitor. For the
average visitor, the experience is expected to be more
one of Emmett's "Pandora's box": simply opening the
box should be sufficient to release the story behind the
objects in it.
Replicas of the First Fleet. In contrast to the boxes,
these present no mystery. Here are objects of the type
that most visitors would expect. They were not sought
by the m u s e u m staff. They were instead presented to the
m u s e u m by the Trust and had been purchased at great
cost. In fact, both students and visitors have shown great
interest in them. The ships are presented as the celebra
tion of a feat - m a n y of the boats were in poor shape and
they were heavily loaded not only with officers but also
with convicts. A n d they do evoke emotions: at the least,
a sense of wonder that these small, rickety vessels should
ever have succeeded in making such a long journey. That
emotion m a y not be a direct part of concerns with 'first
contact' or with Aboriginal Australia. It is, however, more
than the simple acceptance of facts about a catalogued
object.
Feature 4: Lost Subjects
(An Exhibition N o w Discontinued)
It is always interesting to consider an exhibition that
starts with high hopes and yet meets with such audience
resistance that it has to be brought to a close (or, in this
case, to continue life only in the form of a m u s e u m - p u b
lished text). That exhibition is Lost Subjects.
The title, to quote its creator, Paul Carter, is a refer
ence to:
"the past, to the forgotten 'subjects' of Sydney's early
colonial history - ordinary m e n and w o m e n w h o ,
while they m a y figure briefly in the writings of others
(in the official records, say) left behind no historical
trace of their o w n (no diaries, no portraits, no plots of
land, not even perhaps, children), and consequently,
except as passive actors with walk-on parts - 'those
beyond the number stated' - are absent from history,
that linear narrative of colonial progress beloved of
nationalist historians".62
The title, Carter continues, is also a reference to what
m u s e u m s often miss:
"So m u c h slips through the net of their taxonomies;
so m u c h cannot be 'remembered' in their glass cases;
so m a n y 'subjects' are 'lost' in their airless corridors.
Ordinary sounds, for instance; or the histories of
sites being destroyed".63
The slippage, for Carter, came also from the way that
"historians of colonisation ... generally wrote . . . like
the theatre director w h o single-handedly (with one
voice) orchestrates events to give the audience (reader)
an illusion of seamless continuity. H o w to represent
158 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
discontinuities, to evoke offstage points of views, to
dethrone the authority of the lonely voice (which was
usually talking to itself)?"64
For Carter, the solution lay in bringing in more voices:
" O n e way to represent history non-theatrically is to
fragment and collage historical sources: instead of a
single narrative voice, to substitute a crowd of voices,
sometimes in dialogue with one another, sometimes
talking past each other, sometimes frankly indiffer
ent to the other's point of view".65
Translated into the m u s e u m setting, and as experienced
by the visitor, the effects were these (the description is
again Carter's):
"As they arrive at the top floor ... visitors m a y become
aware of voices apparently issuing from the sandstone
wall across the way; drawing close to inspect the
objects displayed there in the wall niches, or about to
pass through a doorway into the adjacent Focus gal
lery, they m a y find themselves fleetingly at the centre
of a miniature drama: nothing can be seen but there
buzzes round one's head (in fact they originate from
loudspeakers concealed in the floor and the ceiling)
animated voices, speaking English, it is true, but
an English full of strange phrases, fragmentary, as
if one had suddenly opened an historical trapdoor
and briefly overheard the early colonial unconscious
speaking, dreaming".66
This soundscape had worked well for Carter previously,
in projects developed for radio. The transition to the
m u s e u m setting presented some particular difficulties.
First of all, m u s e u m s are buildings:
"This difficulty was simply stated: buildings are
inherently theatrical ... In particular, buildings dis
like noise; they aspire to the condition of silence .. .
A s sites of power and of the voices of authority, build
ings are biased against the babble of the crowd, and
try to keep it at bay .. . in the blind and placeless
m e d i u m of radio .. . the collaging of voices and lines
is a recognised dramatic technique for subverting
the conventions of theatrical space and time, but in a
building it clearly represented a drawback".67
Visitors, in fact, did not like Lost Subjects with its ambig
uous and overlapping, arguing voices. For the original
developers of the M u s e u m , including Peter Emmet t , the
audience resistance was difficult to understand:
"But it is hard to fathom the intense resistance by
Sydney museum-goers to these jaunting, chuckling,
sniggering, bumptious conversations accompanying
them on their meanders through M O S . W e lost cour
age and shut the voices d o w n and put Lost Subjects
in our archive ... W h y was there such resistance to
these voices? W h y do people leave the city streets full
of bustle and jostle and wish a m u s e u m to be a tem
ple of silence? W e really wanted this m u s e u m to be a
meeting place, not a mausoleum".68
There m a y well be buildings, Carter argues, where a
voicescape can work well. The specific difficulty at the
M u s e u m of Sydney m a y lie, for example, in visitors being
focused on the significance of the place and on history as
it is usually presented. The notion of "lost subjects", for
example, m a y be less familiar to the general public than
it is to academics and curators. If this is the difficulty, the
place is then what needs to be the focus.69 Alternatively,
visitors m a y need some special preparedness for the
experience of an unexplained voicescape, for this inter
ruption to what Emmet t sees as "our paced and polite
viewing of objects".70
Emmett , P. (1996) Op.cit, p.109.
Ireland, T. (1996) Op.cit, p.102.
Carter, P. (1999) Op.cit., p.l.
ibid., p.l.
ibid., p.3.
ibid.,p.3.
ibid., p.l.
ibid.,pp.4-5.
Emmett , P. ( 1999) ''Introduction to Lost Subjects". In Carter, P. (1999) Op.cit., pp.v-vi.
Carter, P. (1999) Op.cit., p.5.
Emmett , P. (1999) "Introduction to Lost Subjects". Op.cit., p.v.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION » MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 159
Feature 5: Temporary Exhibitions -
Broadening the Image of the City
O n e of the concerns in the M u s e u m has been with find
ing ways to m o v e away from the implication, by most
standard histories, that the only people present were
the English on one side and the Aboriginals on the
other. The Irish are the most c o m m o n addition to the
English, but that still leaves a large discrepancy between
the standard picture and the reality of the multicultural
past. Even a m o n g the convicts, the museum's Education
Officer (Fabienne Virago) comments in interview, the
majority were English or Irish but in all there were over
70 nationalities represented.
H o w is this aspect of history to be conveyed by a
m u s e u m ? In terms of the city's early days, there is so far
little visual indication (the voices in Lost Subjects and
another primarily aural and closed exhibition, The Bond
Street Store, offered more range). S o m e visual images
of later times, however, both acknowledged the city's
mixture and aimed at attracting n e w audiences. These
images were in the form of a series of monthly presen
tations, under the title Reclaiming the Past. Over the
years 1999 - 2000, these were dedicated to bringing out
"Sydney's history, community and identity", using as a
base "music, film and pictures from Sydney's Chinese,
Vietnamese, K h m e r and Polish-Australian c o m m u n i
ties".71 To repeat part of an earlier account by Emmet t ,
the M u s e u m has a special interest in issues that were
"grappled with" in earlier times (e.g. the nature of gov
ernment and of the nation) and that "relate to today's
themes", with the nature of a city's or a country's people
still being of these.72
Images of the city as a space. For m a n y visitors (both
local and international), the main part of the n a m e
(Museum of Sydney) holds the promise that the focus
will be on the city as it developed.
O n e m o v e in this direction has been the addition of a
panorama of the city showing views of the city, accom
panied by a timeline. This exhibition includes both a
changing lightshow with text as well as a large 'table top'
with images of the city decade by decade since 1788. Sev
eral drawers below contain stories of Aboriginal protest
and also broad-based protest against the city's overall
architectural development. These stories argue against
any implication of smooth and uncontested 'progress'.
For most visitors, however, the changing lightshow in
the panorama and the large photographs and celebra
tory texts on the main table strike the dominant role.
A focus on the city itself as a space appears also in the
1999 - 2000 exhibition Sydney Metropolis. This exhibi
tion "traces the shifting geology and oblique geometry
of this city body, through the dramas and dreams of art
ists, architects, planners ... Sydney Metropolis dissects
the passionate core in Sydney's abused urban heart".73
A further exhibition (2001 -2002) highlighted Sydney as
a visual backdrop. This exhibition, On Location: Sydney
included film stills and fashion photography shots that
celebrated the city's location and style.
Celebratory and nostalgic in style was also a 2002
exhibition of posters, photographs, and signboards
related to Sydney's Ferries with an emphasis on 'the way
they were'- both the ferries themselves and the places
they linked. (The city is still marked by m u c h used ferry
services but, before cars and bridges became so domi
nant, the service was wider and often without alterna
tives). Highly popular with older Sydney audiences (on
the day of a visit, the median age appeared to be well
over 50), it evoked m a n y a comment on the lines of "I
remember when ...". Here was no presentation of con
test or complexity. It was an exhibition, however, that
received extensive press coverage in Sydney newspapers
and attracted m a n y people to visit the m u s e u m for the
first time.
The work of Michael Leunig. Where in this line of
development does the exhibition of Leunig's work
belong? This cartoonist is widely popular, and the work
covers interesting questions both of a political and tech
nical kind (the range covers both work on paper and
animated figures). It is certainly familiar to Sydney audi
ences, appearing regularly in Sydney newspapers as well
as in those of other cities.
Leunig, however, does not live in Sydney and his
work does not focus on Sydney as a theme. It might be
seen as a recognition that Sydney is n o w one of several
capitol cities rather than the only metropolis. Leunig's
work might then be seen as representing the develop
ment of shared symbols among cities that once focused
l60 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
on their differences: their being part of separate states,
with separate governments and a history of contested
coming together into a Federation. Leunig's work might
also be seen as especially well-suited for a m u s e u m that
aims at embracing both past and present. O n e recurring
theme, for example, is the significance of times of c o m
municating with nature, with one's o w n quiet self, and
with close others, and the constant threat to this way
of being from modern life (both its pressures and its
absurdities). The stronger reason for making his work
an exhibition for this m u s e u m , however, appears to be
the one expressed in interview by Fabienne Virago:
"Leunig is not part of our charter but perhaps w e need
a little less righteous indignation and maybe w e need
to become a bit more realistic."
D. A Highlighted Issue: Matching
Expectations - Museums A n d Their
Audiences
At the end of each of the previous m u s e u m chapters, I
have taken up an issue highlighted by the particular
museums but relevant also to m a n y others. The issue
highlighted at the end of Chapter 3 had to do with the
significance and place of bodies. The issue highlighted
by Chapter 4 had to do with the extent to which calls for
change, and changes, are occurring within other media.
Chapter 5 highlighted conceptual positions (the posi
tions chosen had to do with the nature of narrative and
of m e m o r y ) and their translation into m u s e u m practice.
The issue highlighted by the present chapter is fore
shadowed by the last of the exhibitions considered for
the M u s e u m of Sydney - the exhibition dealing with
the work of Michael Leunig. In broad terms, it has to
do with a problem all m u s e u m s face: the links between
h o w they function and the audiences they already have
or need to attract.
W e have seen this issue before in a variety of forms.
To take most of the Cape T o w n m u s e u m s as an example,
n e w audiences have to be attracted to follow government
comments that m u s e u m s cease to be for the elite and
widen their visitor base. N e w forms of funding have to
be attracted if a government reduces its support and
insists that m u s e u m s generate more of their o w n funds
for daily operation and for any n e w initiatives. At the
same time, audiences, and particularly sponsors, w h o
are willing and able to pay have their o w n expecta
tions. International visitors, for example - and they are
increasingly a significant part of m a n y m u s e u m s ' budg
ets either through entrance fees as in Sydney or through
shop purchases as in Cape T o w n - expect to see some
thing that is 'foreign' and tour managers direct them
toward places that meet this demand.
The M u s e u m of Sydney offers a base for taking fur
ther this issue of matching expectations. The m u s e u m
continues to receive, from some of the Friends of the
M u s e u m , letters about " h o w the m u s e u m does not
properly reflect the colony. Here is a black armband
view of history, a guilt trip, revisionist".74
More subtly, here is a m u s e u m that hopes audiences
will take an active and experiential role, able to m a n
age with little interpretation, and able to m o v e beyond a
view of history as m a d e up of one authenticated version.
At the same time, one large part of its audience consists
of international visitors, and another consists of school
children. A further audience consists of Aboriginals:
a small but important group for a m u s e u m intent on
bringing out the multi-sided nature of Australian his
tory and on bringing out the continuing Aboriginal
presence and its significance. H o w do the museum ' s
hopes match with the expectations or needs of these
several audiences?
International visitors. Currently international visi
tors make up 75% of the total visitor population at the
M u s e u m of Sydney. At the m o m e n t , their numbers - and
the overall numbers for the m u s e u m - do not match
those hoped for by the Historic Houses Trust. O n e source
of the shortfall is readily acknowledged by the Director
of the Trust, Peter Watts:
Historic Houses Trust Events Calendar for December 1999 - February 2000.
'*• Emmelt cited by Bovers Ball, P. (1997) Op.cit. p.8. 73
Historic Houses Trust Events Calender for December 1999 - February 2000. p.2. 74
Fabienne Virago in interview.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY l6l
"The principal problem is that the m u s e u m has delib
erately set out to allow the visitors to respond, and
offers little didactic and factual material. O u r labels
are quotes ... and w e have found that people are hav
ing trouble decoding them".75
International visitors seem especially likely to experience
decoding difficulties. They m a y well expect a primarily
didactic introduction to the city. Even if they do not,
they bring with them a different history, or at least a lack
of the local history necessary to understand the subtle
stories and juxtapositions offered by the m u s e u m . They
m a y be reached emotionally by displays revolving around
themes that cut deep with many: the themes, for example,
of dispossession, loss of place, survival, and the need to
remember that are the base themes for a m u s e u m such as
the District Six M u s e u m . Tapping into their knowledge
and their feelings, however, m a y involve a museum's tak
ing steps that originally it had not planned to take and
that m a y seem counter to its original plan.
Several changes are envisaged:
"The m u s e u m works exceptionally well for some peo
ple ... so w e will keep the basic design. For more tra
ditional markets, though, they need a hook, and w e
will provide it. We're thinking about an introduction
to Sydney in the theatrette. We're also thinking about
some foreign language signs for our international
visitors".76
School groups. Over the long term, a m u s e u m needs
to develop a core of people w h o see it as an interesting
place to visit or w h o come to develop Visiting the m u s e u m '
as almost an automatic thing to do. The problem is one
of first attracting those audiences to come in. The group
that m a y both swell the immediate number of visitors
and develop the habit of turning to the m u s e u m consists
of schoolchildren. Schools, however, already have visits
to other m u s e u m s on their list. The Australian M u s
e u m and the Art Gallery have a long history of visits
by school groups. W h a t would attract schools and their
students to one more museum?
The m u s e u m turns out to fit a particular niche of
unexpected demand, one that m a y help develop a con
tinuing audience. This demand stems from a change in
the government school syllabus that was implemented
in 1999.77 The schools, Virago (the museum's Education
Officer) comments in interview, were previously c o m
fortable with a syllabus that concentrated on the arrival
of the first fleet and the difficulties of 'settlers'. They
found the new state requirement of approaching the
topic of the First Fleet 'in a balanced way' more prob
lematic.
The difficulty, Virago comments, is understandable.
W h e n Aboriginal Studies was originally introduced at
an experimental level in the mid-90s (only to be
reworked before final implementation in 1999) there
was m u c h criticism from Aboriginal groups as to h o w
teachers taught the subject. M a n y teachers chose then
to "retract from the subject". From 1999, however, they
had no choice but to cover it. They needed to turn to
other sources. A n exhibition on the centenary of Fed
eration, put on by the m u s e u m (Australia's federation
of previously independent states did not happen until
1901), alerted them to the fact that the M u s e u m of Syd
ney, with its resources, was the niche that could fill their
particular need.
It was, then, the happy meeting of a mandatory sylla
bus change and the museum's exhibition on Federation
that began the wave of interest on the part of schools. In
turn, the success of the Federation exhibition in attract
ing school group attendance interested the exhibition
planning staff. The end result is that Virago n o w finds
herself more often invited to planning sessions to air her
views on proposals in regard to educational angles.
H o w then do the educational programs seek to meet
both curriculum expectations and the museum's ethos
of doing more than 'presenting facts'? The focus, Virago
comments, is on recreating experiences and under
standing encounters. Students are asked, for example,
to put themselves in the position of the colonials and
Aboriginal people when the first boats arrived: "These
two groups of people .. . are looking at each other and
seeing each other as very weird."
Children are asked to imagine what the Aboriginals,
w h o had lived all their lives in Sydney, thought was
strange in the way the colonisers behaved, dressed etc.
These first encounters are then brought to life through
questions that relate possibly to the student's o w n lives:
l62 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
"Have you met any people w h o you can't c o m m u n i
cate with?" " M y grandparents don't speak English".
"Wha t can you do to communicate?" "Facial expres
sion or drawings."
To bring h o m e the difficulties in communication, and
therefore the likelihood of conflict and misunderstand
ing, the students are divided into two groups and are
given the task of finding ways to communicate to each
without using language. The students are given an A b o
riginal name for something with an English word below.
The children m a y say the Aboriginal word but not the
English and then have to show the settlers, through m i m e
etc., what it is. The words are usually simple, amusing,
and easy to visualise (e.g. moola - sick, vomit, or dyagala
- hug, embrace). As a way of emphasising the difficulties
of the first encounters, the students are asked: " D o you
think that when you try to communicate like that it
could lead to mistakes?"
The positive is still emphasised:
"That did happen here but there were some friendly
encounters between the Aboriginal people and the
First Fleet and they did try to communicate."
Fabienne Virago comments also that staff speak candidly
with the children:
"Kids are very matter-of-fact. They'll come right out
and say things like 'The English were very selfish'.
They don't carry around the guilt. S o m e m a y m a k e
racist or very P C (politically correct) statements
but most ask direct questions that show they want
to understand, like ' W h y didn't they go somewhere
else?' "
The contested nature of history is also a focus in the edu
cational program. Virago uses the concept of a puzzle
as a way of telling the students that w e need all parts of
history (Aboriginal history, colonial history, natural his
tory and the environment, convict history, multicultural
history etc.) to really understand history. Another c o m
m o n phrase used within the program is " w e don't really
k n o w but w e think". In other words, attempts are made
to qualify positions and statements of fact.
Both of these examples - history as a puzzle and the
qualifying of historical fact - are different from a direct
confrontation over the issue of contested views on his
tory. They underline, however, the general M u s e u m
argument that there is always more than one voice and
that part of the audience's involvement is the right - and
the need - to consider, balance, and live with a multi
plicity of accounts.
Aboriginal audiences and the nature of 'consultation'.
Aboriginals form a small part of the museum's regular
visitors. They are, however, a significant part of the audi
ence and one that the m u s e u m staff always has in mind.
They are very m u c h present as members of staff, as m e m
bers of advisory committees, and as invited guests and
consultants. The constant awareness of their views, and
the disgruntlement of some Friends at what they see as
the preference given to Aboriginal issues and Aboriginal
viewpoints, would appear to leave little room for a diver
gence of expectations.
The reality appears to be one of 'consultation' as
always being amenable to divergent views. The interest
ing dissatisfaction in this case appears in the form of
Aboriginal dissatisfaction with their view of Aboriginal
history not being seen as the last account needed. They
are, in a sense, content to live with two versions of A b o
riginal history: the one that they once offered in answer
to non-Aboriginal inquiries, and the one they n o w offer
to inquiries from people they see as 'their own ' . The dis
content is with the idea of giving space (let alone greater
legitimacy), to a third version: that of non-Aboriginals,
however specialised and scientific the bases of their
knowledge m a y be.
The position is well put by a contributor to one of
the Allowan - I remain seminars. This is Evelyn Craw
ford, a m e m b e r of the Barkindji tribe and Manager of
the Aboriginal Heritage Division of the National Parks
and Wildlife Service.
Crawford first makes the point that the information
taken as "solid fact" by non-Indigenous archaeologists
' 5 E m m e t t cited by Bovers Ball, P. (19971 Op.cit. p.8. 76 ibid.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 163
and anthropologists should in fact be taken with a grain
of salt:
" W e have actually gone back over the years and looked
at some information that was given to archaeologists
and anthropologists by some of our Aboriginal elders.
W h e n . . . I go back to some of those elders and ask is
this really true, did this really happen or did you just
tell somebody this to get rid of them, they say that
is exactly what they did. So while the cultural herit
age record is becoming a lot more accurate, I actu
ally question some of it myself, from back say 20 or
30 years ago, w h e n I've been told by elders, well, what
do you do if you want to get someone off your back.
So things that were written about Aboriginal people
were often non-Aboriginal interpretations of what
Aboriginal people really meant".78
Complicating the issue further is a concern with whose
version should count more w h e n there is divergence:
"If w e say a site is important w h y does it have to be
substantiated by an anthropologist or an archaeolo
gist? W h y can't people accept our word as black peo
ple that this is our heritage and what right do they
have to question it ... It is becoming a battle between
archaeology and cultural heritage to see which . . .
will dominate most. I a m in the process of develop
ing a scenario where Aboriginal cultural heritage
would be the most important part of cultural herit
age assessment, and archaeology a component of that,
to strengthen and support the cultural arguments
of Aboriginal people. It is the exact reverse of that.
Archaeologists run out and do what they want to do
and then they run to the blacks and say tell us about
it".79
Complicating the divergence still further are ques
tions about w h o should present Indigenous material to
non-Indigenous audiences. It is one thing to 'consult'
and then convey on behalf of Indigenous groups. The
preferred m o d e in m a n y cases m a y be that described by
lohn Lennis, Aboriginal Education Officer at the Botanic
Gardens, a site marked by Aboriginal guides and present
ers:
" W h o better to convey an understanding of Aboriginal
cultural heritage than Aboriginal people themselves?
This serves to empower them, to claim control and
enhance their o w n heritage for the benefit and cel
ebration of us all".80
The road of 'consultation' and 'respect for other views of
history' clearly cannot be expected to be smooth, regard
less of h o w deeply attached a M u s e u m is to a 'non-seam
less', 'non-linear', and 'multiple-voice' view of historical
events.
Moving Forward
This chapter completes the pair of m u s e u m s chosen as
examples of the type usually k n o w n as 'historic sites'. Its
ending also marks a turn toward two chapters devoted to
m u s e u m s of the third chosen type: art galleries.
W h y take up this third type? Surely by n o w the main
goals have been reached: the goal of specifying forms of
challenge and change and the circumstances that shape
these, and the goal of developing a 'case-book' that can
provide m u s e u m s with the recognition that their situ
ations are often like those of others, with an increased
ability to anticipate and understand challenge, and with
examples of change that they might wish to borrow,
adapt, or avoid.
Surely also, art galleries are unlikely places in which
to look for additions to what has already been learned.
Here, for example, w e are not likely to find any particu
lar struggle over what is 'natural' and what is 'cultural',
or over whether people should be classed by their physi
cal types or by their patterns of social organisation.
Here w e are not likely to find any particular struggle
over versions of history, or over whether 'reconstruc
tion' should cover a building itself or the meanings that
the original building probably had for several groups of
people. Here even the function of a m u s e u m seems to
be different from the earlier emphasised functions of
educating the public and building a nation.
In fact, art galleries raise interesting questions about
the functions of m u s e u m s and their place as part of
nation-building. Raised also are interesting questions
164 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
about the particular ways in which people construct divi
sions among people, about the characteristics regarded
as typical of 'self and 'other'. People w h o are 'other'
m a y not be seen as physically 'different' or as belonging
only to some remote rural area or some distant histori
cal past. They can, however, still be placed on the other
side of a divide in n e w ways. Their work, for example,
m a y be relegated to the area of 'craft' rather than 'art'. It
m a y be classed as 'art' only if it follows some 'authentic'
or 'traditional' products, with any n e w forms excluded
(these m a y n o w be relegated to the province of ' commer
cial galleries' or to 'department-store kitsch'). It m a y b e
tagged with labels (e.g., as 'African' or as 'Aboriginal')
that the artists themselves m a y reject and that represent
new restrictions rather than a generous acknowledgment
of value. Raised also are new aspects to the issue of o w n
ership. Copyright and appropriation, for example, bring
out questions about h o w ownership is defined that w e
have not seen previously. The same questions arise, also,
when it comes to questions about w h o has the right to
curate or comment on work that 'belongs to m y people'.
In short, here are n e w opportunities to consider the
nature of challenge and transformation.
The syllabus can be found at: http://www.bos.nsw.edu.au. For those not familiar with the
Australian school system, the significance of the syllabus stems from government control
over the school subjects that (a) count for credit in the state-wide examinations taken by
pupils from both state and private schools at two points during their high school years, and
that (b) government departments take into account when considering accreditation and
funding for a school.
Crawford, E . (2000) In the Allowan -1 Remain seminar series transcripts. Op.cit., p.4.
79ibid.,p.7.
Lennis, I. (2000) In the Allowan - 1 Remain seminar transcripts, Op.cit. p.38.
D TRANSFORMATION "» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 165
CHAPTER 7
The South African National Gallery
CH A P T E R S 7 A N D 8 provide the third and last
pair of chapters. Again, the first in the pair focuses
on Cape T o w n , the second on Sydney. For each city, I
focus on one m u s e u m . In Cape Town , this is the South
African National Gallery (the S A N G part of the Iziko
organisation). In Sydney, it is the m u s e u m k n o w n locally
as simply the Art Gallery. Both are government funded.
Both also cover a wide sweep but have one section or one
department devoted to work named as local in origin:
African Art or Aboriginal Art.
Both galleries are also in places where 'local art' has
found a h o m e in commercial galleries and, in its less
expensive versions, in shops and bazaars catering for
tourists seeking 'something different'. In Australia, for
instance, every second T-shirt m a d e for the tourist mar
ket (often not made in Australia), "has an Aboriginal-
style design on it, and a Western dot art painting is a
must-have souvenir for the discriminating tourist".1 In
Cape T o w n the shopping mall k n o w n as Century City
has a large section devoted to African artefacts and
curios under the n a m e 'AfriBizarre'. The streets and
markets surrounding the Gallery also abound with
artefacts, of varying quality, originating from the entire
African continent and brought to Cape T o w n to meet
the tourist interest.
Both galleries raise some questions of the kind
already seen in earlier chapters. Here again, for exam
ple, are questions about h o w images and stories are con
structed, about what is displayed and h o w this is done.
Here again are also questions about the ways in which
distances are created among social groups. N o w , h o w
ever, w e can see some new aspects to the ways in which
distances are created. The very naming of some work
as local in origin, for example, creates a distance, one
often accompanied by other distance-creating divides:
between 'art' and 'craft', between what belongs to art
galleries or to 'ethnology', between one kind of art or
artist and another. Raised also are n o w some particu
lar questions about the affirmation of identity. Naming
work as 'African art' or 'Aboriginal art', for example,
and pointing to its presence in the Gallery as a sign of
its being valued, is a statement about origin. It is also a
claim that the work belongs in some way to 'the nation'
or to 'the state'. Far from being irrelevant to politics, or
aloof from the task of 'nation-building', then, art gal
leries m a y have a particular role to play and particular
contributions to make , and the nature of that role and
those contributions calls for exploration.
To take some last c o m m o n features, both galleries
face some problems of definition. H o w , for example, is
the newly recognised art to be defined or grouped? Is
'African Art', for example, to be defined by its topics
(these paintings are about Africa), by where the artists
live, or by the colour of their skins? They face as well
some particular challenges when it comes to viewers.
H o w does a gallery manage in a setting where the usual
visitors are likely to continue perceiving the traditional
art of the people as 'craft' (South Africa) or as able to be
166 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION 'V MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
appreciated only if there is an accompanying text that
tells you 'the story' that the painting illustrates (Aus
tralia)? Are there ways to encourage viewers not sim
ply to 'look' but also to see and reflect upon the ways
in which images of colonised and colonisers are con
structed and used? Faced by both galleries are also ques
tions of budget. H o w do state or national galleries sus
tain a collection policy - so dear to their hearts in addi
tion to temporary exhibitions - in times when donors
are increasingly few, the cost of purchasing m a n y forms
of art is escalating, and public funds are earmarked for
more obviously urgent areas of need?
Those remarks are all about c o m m o n features. W h a t
makes the South African Gallery especially interest
ing? It has appeared in previous chapters as having an
intriguing political history over the last 20 years. It
m a d e a brief appearance in Chapter 2, for example, as
one of the m u s e u m s merged in 1999 into the overarch
ing IZIKO organisation, linked administratively - by
government fiat - with 14 other m u s e u m s in Cape T o w n
and, with them, charged with the tasks of 'transforma
tion' and 'nation-building'. It appeared also, in Chapter
3, as both the site of political protest in the 1980's for
its non-inclusiveness (its 'European-bias') and, in the
1990's, as the place where several Indigenous groups met
to claim the return of Sarah Baartman's remains and
to voice both support for and protest against an exhibi
tion (Miscast) based on replicas of the San body-casts
featured in the contentious B u s h m a n diorama (Chap
ter 3). H o w , one wonders, does this gallery and the work
it presents fit into moves toward representativeness,
inclusiveness, or reconciliation? H o w does it change
from being 'Eurocentric' to being a place that n o w has
a Department of African Art and presents 'African art'
at its best?
To take up such questions, I shall again follow the
structure of earlier chapters. The first section will again
be a brief visitor's eye-view. The sections that follow
take up background and beginnings, the growth of col
lections, and changes after the watershed of political
change in 1994. The final section, as before, takes up
an issue highlighted by this m u s e u m but relevant to
all. The issue selected in the present case has to do with
the several functions of m u s e u m s . For that topic, I shall
draw not only on m u s e u m material but also on analyses
of functions of other media (television particularly).
The sources are again a mixture of direct observa
tion, interviews (here with the Iziko's Director of Art
Collections Marilyn Martin and with the Curator of
African Art, Carol Kaufmann) , and written material.2
Again, where print or website texts contained points
m a d e in the interviews, I have given preference to the
texts as cited sources.
A. A Visitor's Eye View
From the outside, the Gallery, as the Director says, is "not
inviting". That impression stems both from the parking
space at the front of the building and from the official-
looking building itself (painted immaculately in white,
and complete with columns and a wide stone staircase
that narrows to a dark and deep entrance). To bring peo
ple more readily into the Gallery, Marilyn Martin's ideal
is to add exterior permanent sculpture work as well as
a n e w building. In the meantime, the Gallery does not
start off well, especially for n e w visitors.
Casey, D . (2001) "The National M u s e u m of Australia: Exploring the Past, Illuminating the
Present and Imagining the Future". In Mclntyre, D . and Wehner , K . (Eds.) (2001) National
Museums: Negotiating Histories. Canberra: National M u s e u m of Australia, p. 8.
" The generous provision of interview time by Marilyn Martin and Carol K a u f m a n n is hap
pily acknowledged. Marilyn Martin was appointed Director in 1990. She c a m e in then at
a time w h e n political protest was already strong and with the intention of both producing
change and establishing the gallery as one with a strong African and international reputa
tion. Carol K a u f m a n n has been Curator of African Art since shortly after Marilyn Martin
created the position. She has been especially responsible for turning the gallery's collection
policy toward art forms other than "canvas" with exhibitions of beadwork (the first in
1993) as one striking example.
The visit to the m u s e u m was m a d e in N o v e m b e r 2001. The written material comes
from several sources. For matters related to the Gallery in general, I have drawn especially
on three pieces related to the 1996 exhibition: Contemporary South African Art, 1985 - 1995.
These are:
(1) Martin, M . "Director's Introduction";
(2) Bedford, E . "Curator's Preface" and
(3) D u b o w , N . "Conversation with Professor Neville D u b o w " . D u b o w was Chair
person of the Acquisitions Committee from 1982 to 1995, and a m e m b e r of the
Committee from 1971. The interview was conducted by E m m a Bedford (Cura
tor) and lane Taylor (incoming Chairperson).
These three materials are available o n http://www.museums.org.za/sang/SA/art/art_
intr.htm; http://www.museums.org.za/sang/SA/art/art_prof.htm; and h t tp : / /www.muse -
ums.org.za/sang/SA/art/art_inte.htm. Additional source material is contained in a series of
Director's messages: Martin, M . "Director's Message" in Bonani Newsletters. These newslet
ters are available on http://www.museums.org.za/sang/pub/_index.htm. Material related to
specific issues and exhibitions will be cited as these topics arise throughout the chapter.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 167
O n entering, the first space encountered is a large,
high-ceilinged foyer with several contemporary can
vases by artists whose names imply a mixture of back
grounds: some clearly 'African', some not. The topics
are predominantly political in nature, with particular
emphasis on aspects of 'the struggle', drawn from the
period k n o w n as 'transitional'. In D u b o w ' s description,
the S A N G has "the best collection of South African art
in the world on the so-called transitional era between
the immediately 'pre-negotiated revolution period' and
the 'post-negotiated revolution period' ".3
That appearance of contemporary relevance, h o w
ever, can be readily offset by the nature of the Gallery's
main collections. To the left of the foyer at the time
of a visit in November 2001, for example, was a room
offering a collection of paintings donated earlier by Sir
Abe Bailey, one of the major donors of paintings during
the 193o's to 1950's. The paintings, from the Victorian
period, were offset by walls painted in dark green. Pre
dominantly landscape scenes, with the people in some
dressed in full hunting garb, they seemed at first out of
place in this Gallery. The interpretive text emphasised
the importance of Bailey as a donor and the place of the
collection in the Gallery's history. It was only later, h o w
ever, that I saw a larger relevance, brought out by the
c o m m e n t of a retiring Chair of the Acquisitions C o m
mittee when asked about the Gallery's resources:
"Historically, I think that its holdings of the Victorian
period do constitute a strength. They certainly do
show where w e have come from and I think it is
entirely futile for us to try to wish away our colo
nial past and to pretend that it did not happen . . . It's
unlikely that w e could afford any more work of that
kind ... what w e do have constitutes a resource".4
That resource, it becomes clearer later in the interview
with D u b o w by Jane Taylor and E m m a Bedford and in
the one conducted directly with Marilyn Martin, is part
of a claim for the Gallery's possession of depth in some
areas. It is also a trading chip in negotiating exchanges
for temporary exhibitions with other galleries: a par
ticular necessity when there is little money to acquire
increasingly expensive n e w works.
To the right of the foyer is the Gallery shop, and a
café. M u s e u m shops have come to be recognised as an
essential part of all m u s e u m budgets and as part of what
people come to see. (One c o m m e n t on the new Tate
Modern, for example, is that it is essentially a "shopping
mall" in style, with better lighting and more inviting
colour in its shop than in parts of its display rooms.5)
As a visitor, I have come to expect what appears to be a
constant feature in Cape Town's m u s e u m shops: bead-
work, woodwork, woven mats, textiles. M u c h of the
same range is also offered for street sale, but the quality
at the S A N G is higher. S o m e of the woven work is espe
cially striking: well above average 'street-sale' quality
but also larger than most tourists would carry away.
O n the same floor is a further set of rooms used for
temporary exhibitions. In one is an interesting display
of sculptured birds, combining pieces from the South
African M u s e u m and from the Gallery's resources: a
tangible sign of Iziko's m u s e u m s working together. The
juxtapositions also argue against perceiving art only in
terms of region or of period. I find more compelling,
however, several pieces of wire work in the courtyard
and the flurry of activity in a further set of rooms. Here
are the preparations for a major photography exhibition
on H I V / A I D S : a further reminder that the Gallery cov
ers more than conventional forms of 'art' and is atten
tive to social issues in recent and current times.
B. Background And Beginnings
Officially, the Gallery came into being in 1895, when
the "South African Gallery Act" was promulgated. That
Act declared "a small but already significant collection,
assembled by the citizens of Cape T o w n , (to be) the
property of the Colonial Government".6 The building
in which the paintings were housed was also taken over.
The Act was, in Marilyn Martin's description, "a very
auspicious decision indeed, but one which also held neg
ative implications for the future",7 opening the Gallery
to more government control and decreasing the sense
of ownership by private individuals w h o were potential
donors of paintings and funds.
Before that time, the accumulation of paintings, and
the acquisition of a building, had been in private hands.
To take some dates from Marilyn Martin's review, the
l68 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION o* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
year 1761 saw an exhibition of 32 paintings in the h o m e
of the sexton of the Dutch Reformed Church. They
were chosen from a collection donated by Joachim van
Dessin to the Church. S o m e of these paintings were
later to be exhibited in the South African Library and
to come under the custodianship of the South African
Fine Arts Association: an Association founded by T h o
mas Butterworth Bayley and Abraham de Schmidt. The
Association began in 1871 to move toward forming a Gal
lery for Cape T o w n , going beyond the relatively private
exhibitions organised by members of the Association.
The year 1872 then saw the acquisition of a building and
the bequest by Butterworth Bayley of 45 paintings. By
the time of the Government Act in 1895, the Gallery's
collection came to approximately 100 paintings.
After 1895, to continue Martin's description, "years of
neglect and indecision followed until the present build
ing was opened on 3 November 1930: The funds came
from the Government, the City Council and from the
H y m a n Liberman estate for the addition of the Liber-
m a n Hall and the magnificent memorial doorway,
carved by Herbert Meyerowitz".8
During the 1930's, further rooms were added and an
Annexe acquired. Renovations to the building contin
ued throughout the 1990's but, in Martin's phrase, "the
lack of adequate space and facilities has been critical for
a decade".
Methods of Collection
Donations are important for all museums but perhaps
especially so for art galleries. They m a y take the form
of the direct donation of objects or of funds to pur
chase objects. The S A N G has a continuing history of
both forms. The donations of paintings that marked
its start, for example, were followed by others after the
1930's, when the n e w building was in place. Martin notes
the "magnificent presentations from Lady Michaelis, Sir
E d m u n d and Lady Davis, Sir Abe Bailey and Henry van
den Bergh." There was, however, "no regular purchase
grant during the 1930's and 1940's, and no full-time
Director, this task being carried out in an honorary
capacity by the Directors of the Michaelis School of Fine
Art."
By 1980, an Acquisitions Policy was made formal.
This "stated that art from the European founder coun
tries, Africa and South Africa (should) be purchased".9
Budgets and politics, however, increasingly altered those
directions of preference.
C. The Growth Of Collections:
Pre-1994
I shall give particular attention to the period that spans
1970 to 1994. Noted especially are (1) the continuing
importance of donors and of budget constraints, espe
cially on acquisitions, (2) the mixture of 'art and poli
ties', and (3) the move toward 'African art' in a variety of
forms. This last move is especially noteworthy. It sparks
questions about w h y the move was made, what defines
African art', the place and impact of commercial galleries
promoting 'African' work, and the relevance of narrow
concerns with 'fine art', especially in a country marked
by a struggle against the privileging of one social group
and the exclusion of others.
Donors and Budgets
It is inevitable that accounts from Directors and m e m
bers of any Acquisitions Committee will emphasise
budget constraints. Nonetheless, the financial con
straints for the S A N G do emerge as especially stringent.
The acquisitions budget in 1996 was around the equiva
lent of US$40,000 with little state adjustment. According
to Marilyn Martin it has remained at this level "for more
than a decade".10
All the more reason then to be thankful for the con-
Dubow, N . in interview ( 1996) Op.cit.
4 ibid.
The Independent, September 10, 2002, p.3. The comment was made as part of a debate on the
current architecture of museums (art galleries especially], with Jacques Herzog ( the archi
tect for the Tate Modern) criticising Gehry's museum in Bilbao and N e w York's Museum
of Modern Art ( M O M A ) , and with several acknowledging that "shopping" is now a strong
part of what gallery visitors expect to do, either physically or by catalogue.
Martin, M . ( 1995) "Director's Message". In Sonani 3rd quarter, 1995. South African National
Gallery: Cape Town
7 ibid.
Martin, M . (1996) "Director's Introduction" to the 1996 exhibition. Op.cit.
9 ibid.
1 0 Duhow, N . (1996) Op.cit., Martin, M . 1996, Op.cit.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "»• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 169
tinuing support of donors and Friends. Marilyn M a r
tin's Newsletters record these regularly. In 1999, for
example, Martin records the assistance of both private
and commercial interests: "In the previous bonani I
detailed the results of the Save the Sang fund-raising
drive which was spearheaded by Zonnenbloem Wines.
Since December w e have received R30 000,00 from Rose
Korber and R 4 000,00 from Ben and Shirley Rabinow-
itz, bringing the total to R81500,oo".11
The Mixture of Art and Politics
To bring out the particular forms of that intermingling,
I turn to an account of h o w the S A N G came in 1979 to
acquire and to display a painting by Paul Stopfork, The
Interrogators. The account is offered by Neville D u b o w in
response to a question by the incoming Chairman of the
Acquisitions Committee, Jane Taylor, about the way that
"in recent South African art production, artistic experi
mentation frequently also meant political engagement".
Jane Taylor asked specifically about any "particular epi
sodes .. . in acquisition practice at the Gallery that would
illustrate some of the links between issues of 'quality',
artistic experiment and politics". D u b o w selected an
event that he recalls as occurring in 1979:
"The work was a three-part work . . . quite large,
showing three male heads, somewhat sinister .. . the
images were taken, I imagine, from newspaper pho
tographs of three of the most prominent police inter
rogators of the days of Total Onslaught . . . mounted
one above the other .. . The manner of the piece was a
sort of heightened realism ... the technique was very
distinctive."
E m m a Bedford, at the time curator at the m u s e u m ,
notes at a later point in the interview that the three faces
are "portraits of the secret police w h o interrogated Steve
Biko". Biko died in the course of interrogation, "and the
chair that appears in the work is the one to which he was
bound".12
D u b o w continues:
"The work was first submitted to the Acquisitions
Committee as I recall . . . and then to the full Board"
(anything about which the Committee was doubt
ful went to the full Board). "I had k n o w n of the work
earlier ... under the original title ... The Interrogators
... The title under which it was submitted to the Board
was ... Tryptych ... There was a lot of uneasy h u m
ming and hawing .. . and I got the feeling that those
members of the Board w h o were there as State rep
resentatives had a kind of uneasy feeling that they .. .
more or less knew w h o they (the three m e n ) might
be but were not prepared to say so .. . In the end that
particular discussion was referred to m e ... and I said
that yes ... the work should be acquired by the Board
because for m a n y reasons I found that the technique
of its presentation was rather interesting ... In the
event, the work was acquired: it went on display ...
A n d after a certain period of time ... the real title re
appeared".13
A question remained for D u b o w as to h o w the first
change in title came about. E m m a Bedford suggests that
the shift m a y have been made by the Director at that
time. She recalls that "the Director was very m u c h aware
of the power of the work. From time to time when w e
had visits from key people in the Education Ministry, the
work had to be taken d o w n and replaced with a less con
troversial work".14
Caution was clearly warranted, given the dependence
on State funds and the invasive destruction in 1991 of a
sculpture of Terre Blanche and two associates: a sculp
ture that members of his far-right party found objec
tionable.15 At a lower official level, staff could be less
constrained. E m m a Bedford, for example - she was an
Education Officer at the time - recalls that "the meaning
of the work was quite clear amongst staff... It became a
focal point . . . for large school groups ... A springboard
for talking about things that weren't being talked about
in their school history texts or in other ways".16
The Move Into 'African Art'
This move is the main part of this section on the growth
of the collections. Noted first are some general features of
the move , plus some of the circumstances that prompted
it, followed by a closer look at some exhibitions curated
by Carol Kaufmann, appointed when Marilyn Martin
170 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION c*> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
- shortly after her o w n appointment in 1990 - created a
new position: Curator of African Art.
S o m e general features to the m o v e : Western or tra
ditional idiom? The Gallery was not without works by
artists w h o were 'Black Africans'. In Carol Kaufmann's
description:
"(The) m u s e u m hung on its walls previously - until
quite recently, I would say, until the 1990's - works
that were produced in the Western idiom. If the work
was produced by an African artist such as George
Pemba or Joanne Seketo in pastels, or guache, or
watercolours, or oils, it was Western art and accept
able in the m u s e u m . That's w h y in our earliest collec
tions w e have works produced during the apartheid
regime and earlier: works by black artists, but the
work was in a Western idiom".17
Slow to move into the Gallery were works regarded as
produced for sale in the burgeoning commercial galler
ies (a feature that will appear again in the chapter that
follows on Australian Aboriginal art). That slowness,
D u b o w comments, was because "The National Gallery
... had a particular mindset during the 1970's and the
early 1980's". At that time, several commercial galleries,
in Johannesburg especially, had begun to display and sell
work done "in what was becoming k n o w n in their terms
as 'the township style'". "The National Gallery ... did not
see that as the kind of work that necessarily should be
inside a national art gallery ... It was being bought very
m u c h as the exception rather than the rule - not really
the kind of thing to start looking for" or to be commis
sioned. The artists themselves often did not think of their
work in National Gallery terms, but as "meant to supply
a commodity that would be of interest" commercially.18
Not collected or displayed at all until 1990 (when
Marilyn Martin hung some African weaving next to
conventional 'fine art') was work regarded as "everyday
traditional". These were works made with wood , wire,
bone or beads, weavings, ceramics, or headdresses. That
move , Kaufmann comments, called for "a major leap of
faith, turning the m u s e u m upside d o w n , by recognising
that the cultural production, or the visual production,
of South Africa's people - m e n as well as w o m e n - was
worthy of exhibition in a national gallery".1''
S o m e circumstances prompting the m o v e . O n e of
these was the new Director's conviction that the less
conventional forms of artwork had high artistic value in
themselves. The critical feature to look for was quality - a
feature that distinguished the Gallery's approach to col
lection from that of an ethnographic gallery:
" W e buy differently from, say (buying) for a collection
of ethnology. They would buy a group .. . the whole
lot ... irrespective of aesthetic quality, because that is
their collecting practice. W h e n w e buy, w e look at the
individual object".20
For Marilyn Martin also, it was time to abandon Euro
centric categories such as 'fine art':
"(T)he beadwork, the baskets, the textiles, the head
dresses . . . have exactly the same status as the paint
ings and the sculptures. I 'm not interested in the
so-called 'fine art' categories because they are not
our categories. They're European categories and w e
shifted from all that to be inclusive".21
Added to a conviction about categories were also some
circumstances of budget and of recognition. To cite M a r
ilyn Martin again:
Martin, M . ( 1999) "Director's Message". In Bonani 2nd quarter, 1999. South African National
Gallery: Cape Town
1 2 Bedford, E.( 1996) Op.clt.
1 3 Dubow, N . (1996) Op.cit.
1 4 Bedford, E. (1996) Op.cit.
1 5 Martin, M . (1996) Op.cit.
1 6 D u b o w , N . (1996) Op.cit.
Kaufmann, C . (2001) Taped interview with Enrique Castro Rios from the University of Ber
gen. All comments attributed to Kaufmann are from this interview.
1 8 Dubow, N . ( 1996) Op.cit.
19
Kaufmann, C . (2001) Interview, Op.cit. The lateness of this move is an interesting contrast
to events in the Sydney Gallery. There collection began with the traditional. It was the work
done more in the "Western idiom", in the sense of being on canvas, that was slow to be
acquired by the Aboriginal Art Department, with the first purchases made by the Curator
of Contemporary Art. 20
Martin, M . (2001) Interview with Vitus Nanbigne from the University of Bergen. 2 1 ibid.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY I7I
"Already by 1980 it was becoming difficult to m a k e sig
nificant additions to the modern Western or the older
European collections .. . Inadequate Government
subsidies, unsympathetic tax laws, the low value of
the South African currency and the high prices of
art works on the international scene combined to
put the institution in an unenviable position. These
realities and the extraordinary vitality and power
of the art which began to emerge in South Africa
during the 1980's . . . brought a decided shift ... from
buying internationally and focusing on established
South African artists to .. . work originating in rural
and 'peripheral' contexts ... alongside art which is
influenced by the Western 'mainstream' ",22
S o m e specific directions. As examples, I take two exhi
bitions curated by Carol Kaufmann: one based on bead-
work (1993), the other on objects made of gold (1994).
The beadwork exhibition took the Gallery's usual
audience by surprise (Carol Kaufmann jokingly refers
to herself as the curator of "beadwork and everything
else"). Collecting the beadwork had begun in 1990. O n e
reason for focusing on beadwork was that this was the
work of w o m e n , often neglected in the collection of
artwork. Another was the presence of a recognition of
aesthetic quality that was shared by both Westerners
and local groups:
"Beadwork from South Africa .. . was m a d e into elab
orate objects or ornament. . . and handed d o w n from
generation to generation .. . Even people w h o today
are Westernised and have a University education .. .
still have a great ... reverence for traditions of the
past . . . beadwork often honours the ancestors and
marks the rites of passage .. . from birth to death".23
Beadwork had the further value, Kaufmann comments,
of creating bridges for the Gallery into several African
communities. She could consult with them on their
perceptions and preferences, could invite help with
curating, could benefit from their advice as to what
she should look for and what the meanings were of
various pieces. In these several ways, the Gallery could
effectively move toward inclusiveness:
"Our mission and our mandate is to be accessible. W e
are an education institution ... W e are a developing
nation with a very fraught and difficult history where
m a n y people .. . have been excluded from appreci
ating art and also from being able to celebrate their
o w n culture."
The exhibition with gold objects met a further goal. Part
of the Gallery's mission, for Kaufmann, is "to look to the
past and some of our great achievements of the past. As
South Africans w e can celebrate together ... this is in
m a n y ways empowering and very .. . satisfying for the
people w h o get involved in our programs". The 1994
exhibition was part of that kind of move . It brought
together small objects "made of gold over 1000 years
ago". It also brought together, in an expression of Afri
can pride, "300 kings and other representatives from the
Northern Regions". There is, in effect, more than one
way to turn to "traditional" African Art and to move the
Gallery away from an apparent privileging of art in "the
Western idiom".
Limits to what can be displayed. As is the case also
with Aboriginal Art (Chapter 8), the collection and dis
play of traditional material means that some items need
to be considered in terms other than aesthetic quality
alone:
"(O)ur Acquisition Policy clearly states that w e
acquire works according to their aesthetic merit ...
but in m y field ... w e are dealing with living popula
tions and some of these works have great spiritual or
sacred significance. W e do have to be careful. There
are certain objects that w e wouldn't acquire for our
collections because they sometimes incorporate
human body parts such as hair or bones .. . There are
also ... for example, items of regalia that are worn
in rituals such as when m e n go through initiation or
w o m e n through puberty that should not be viewed by
any other members of the public than those w h o were
present at the ritual. W e have to be respectful".24
Questions of definition: W h a t is 'African Art'? In Aus
tralia, a similar question - what is Aboriginal Art? - calls
for the work to be by Aboriginal artists, and sometimes
172 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
for the work to be in a m o d e regarded as 'traditionally
Aboriginal'. In the South African context, the answer is
mixed. Asked h o w her area is defined, Carol Kaufmann
replies:
" W e have not resolved the issues inherited from the
apartheid regime as to what to call the area in which I
work. I work with the visual production of Southern
African people, of Indigenous people, and w e have
called it formally African Art. W e have a lot of dif
ficulty with that appellation because w e are living
in the continent of Africa and surely every bit of art,
contemporary or otherwise, that comes from this
continent is African art. So w h y are w e choosing
... to single out a Department of African Art? The
answer . . . is to work within perimeters that were for
mally excluded by a colonial or Western definition of
a m u s e u m in South Africa."
Carol Kaufmann's Department is the only one in the
Gallery to be n a m e d by any reference to a region. The
others are m o r e by conventional context. There is, for
example, a Curator for Prints and Drawings, another for
Photography, and another for Paintings and Sculpture.
The meanings of terms such as 'African Art' and 'South
African Art' clearly cover more than references to regions
of origin and one wonders h o w far the connotations are
shared a m o n g m u s e u m curators or a m o n g viewers.
D. Changes After 1994
The S A N G was clearly faced with the d e m a n d that it
m o v e toward the government's national objectives in
several ways. A s part of the broad goal of nation-build
ing, for example, it should become more 'relevant' and
m o r e 'inclusive' in what it collected and displayed and
in its staffing and its audiences. In return, government
approval and support might be expected.
H o w far did, or could, the S A N G meet these goals?
I take up first some events and questions related to
aspects of relevance and inclusiveness (inclusiveness in
the form of what is collected and in staffing). Greater
space is then given to some exhibitions that encapsu
lated moves toward encouraging viewers to think criti
cally about what they were presented with (this is the
exhibition Lines of Sight) and toward developing a sense
of the Gallery as being sensitive to the interests and per
spectives of its viewers. The prime example for the lat
ter m o v e (toward signs of sensitivity) is the exhibition
Miscast. It backfired, in the sense that it aroused a great
deal of unanticipated criticism for its insensitivity to a
group that the gallery least wished to offend. This was
the Khoi-San, already at the centre of the ' B u s h m a n '
diorama at the South African M u s e u m and n o w appar
ently being again treated with a lack of respect. (Worse,
'bodies' were again an issue). Miscast is an exhibition
that calls for thought on the part of any m u s e u m faced
with challenge and change in its representations of'first
peoples' or 'minority groups'.
Moving Toward 'Relevance'
The Gallery n o w meets with fewer occasions of political
disapproval with regard to works bought or displayed.
It was, instead, welcomed, together with staff from the
Mayibuye Centre, in the dismantling of s o m e works from
Parliament, and the hanging of others, in advance of the
Parliament's first meeting in February 1996. The paint
ings to be removed signalled the old regime (e.g., a por
trait of Vervoerd pointing to a m a p of'Bantustan' South
Africa). The dismantling was one in which "soon M P ' s ,
parliamentary workers and Gallery staff were applaud
ing, cheering, and even jeering, as the first paintings were
removed" and in which the S A N G ' s Director observed
that, in "an absurd yet pertinent gesture of symbolic
political irony", m a n y of the pieces of an exhibition about
to displayed temporarily - Art Against Apartheid - were,
while waiting to be hung, "spread out on the very seats
used by parliamentarians w h o previously supported the
Apartheid regime".25
Still being faced - and always likely to be so - is the extent
to which meeting with government objectives means act
ing only in ways that m a k e governments or bureaucrats
~* Martin, M . (1996) Op.cit. 73
Kaufmann, C . 12001) Interview. 24
ibid., emphasis added. 75
Martin, M . (1996) "Director's Message'. In Bonani. Op.cit., 2nd quarter.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 173
feel comfortable. The hope of the previous Chairman
of the Acquisition's Committee, Neville D u b o w , is that
the Gallery will always m a k e the relevant Government
Departments uneasy:
"I would like to think that the National Gallery would
buy work that might cause a future Director to
wonder whether that work could still hang w h e n the
future Minister of Culture comes to visit the Gallery
... I like to think that that kind of challenging work
would still continue to be acquired".26
Given the current orientation of South Africa's Gov
ernment toward AIDs (an orientation toward the non-
recognition of its epidemic extent), the topic of a late
2001 photographic exhibition - H I V / A I D S - m a y well
present one of the next set of "challenging" topics. O n
Marilyn Martin's list are several of these:
"Issues of gender, ecology, language, abortion, the
death penalty, literacy, job creation, lack of basic
services and education, land ownership, unbridled
criminal violence, financial fraud, rampant capital
ism, international drug dealing and the devastating
effects of AIDs are on our minds and lips."
In effect, there is no shortage of social issues to serve as
"a source of stimulation and inspiration", over and above
"the horrors and inequities of apartheid (that) will haunt
this society for a long time".27
W h a t appears to be occurring in less-than-hoped
for fashion, however, is the provision of government
support. At a time w h e n 'nation-building' is a priority,
and when 'culture' is one of the 'industries' expected to
build wealth rather than drain it, art galleries are less
likely to be seen as priority recipients of government
aid. More is expected to 'come through the door'. The
Director's former newsletters are then, not surprisingly,
accounts of a long period of uncertainty with regard
to support, of resistance to pressure for charging an
admission fee to the Gallery and, at the more day-to-day
level, of difficulties in both taking proper care of what
is already held and of moving toward the appropriate
presentation of n e w installations (removing all those
visible wires, for example, that detract from the power
of video installations).
Carol Kaufmann's comments, m a d e late in 2001,
bring h o m e the extent of those difficulties:
" W e don't k n o w whether w e have our posts or what
our budgets will be. W e have had to accept drops
in salaries because there is no money. W e are so poor,
there are no support systems. W e don't have c o m
puters that are up to date. W e don't have printers that
work. There is no m o n e y for adequate publicity, no
money for anything. W e do it all on a shoestring.
W e have to fundraise ourselves, so w e are really
exhausted. A curator's job is fundraising, researching,
physically hanging up the exhibitions, doing the
media rounds. W e even end up cooking for opening
exhibitions, or raising funds to transport people. It
is a very hands-on approach. The major setback has
been the lack of finances and the lack of support
from our superiors ... Perhaps they aren't aware of
h o w difficult it is to work without proper administra
tive support, or materials or funds".28
Moving Toward Inclusiveness:
Issues of Purchase and Staffing
The Gallery is under political pressure to be 'inclusive' in
what it presents, to display creative works of several
kinds and by several groups of people. People in the
Gallery themselves wish to be inclusive, with the full
recognition that this is a critical step in un-doing the
damages of apartheid and moving forward. The ques
tion is one of h o w that broad goal can be translated
into practice. The kinds of n e w work that are pur
chased, and staffing, are two areas in which such trans
lations can occur. Neither, however, is without its
hazards: hazards that the S A N G ' s situation brings out. At
the same time, the Gallery seeks to protect its status as
an institution that other galleries see as worth lending to
and as having works worth borrowing.
Questions of collecting. If a gallery is to be 'inclusive',
does this mean that it should spread its purchasing
budget evenly across the artworks of several regions or
groups of people? That kind of goal m a y be out of line
with a gallery's budget and also with its need to develop
174 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
a depth in some areas that will c o m m a n d respect from
other galleries and be a bargaining chip when it comes
to the cross-borrowing increasingly needed for any large
exhibition.
Budget is a major consideration. Constrained by bud
get, and under conditions of "cultural boycott" by several
other countries, the Gallery did pass, D u b o w comments,
through a period of "regionalism". Increasingly, however,
what had appeared to be works on 'the margins' of what
was happening on the European scene has come to be
seen by curators in other galleries as 'worthwhile
regionalism', as work worth borrowing. W h a t remains
n o w is a regret that the Acquisitions Committee did not
do more in this direction, particularly in the form of
purchasing more work by black artists. Earlier, the c o m
mittee was held back by its concern that work sought
by commercial galleries was "not for the Gallery". N o w ,
the committee finds that it cannot afford the best of the
work by these painters and sculptors.29
Such purchases, however, might not be purely issues
of what is recognised as quality. Jane Taylor, for exam
ple, asks D u b o w :
" H o w does one address or make redress for the ... rac
ist and culturalist practices of a past policy without
perpetuating the same or related racist policies? If
one did not buy black artists in the past, should one
n o w buy black artists? There is a kind of compen
satory racism that one gets caught in; h o w do you
implement a policy that ... makes redress for histori
cal inequities, but which is not racist?"30
That issue, she continues, applies not only to the number
of works one buys but also to the percentage of the
budget one spends:
"If works by black artists represent one percent of the
acquisitions expenditure, even though they make up
thirty percent of the works acquired .. . these ques
tions raise issues about h o w one makes redress."
Questions of staffing. H o w far does 'inclusiveness'
extend to staffing? That type of question has come up
in earlier chapters. Are Indigenous people appearing,
for example, in any m u s e u m capacity? In the top jobs or
the lesser jobs? A m o n g the volunteers? O n the boards of
Trustees or Advisory Groups? H o w does one balance the
need for their inclusion with the need also for training
and for interest on their part?
In discussions with members of the S A N G , staffing
questions took an interesting direction. Both Marilyn
Martin and Carol Kaufmann were asked h o w they felt
people would regard there being a white curator for
'African Art'. Marilyn Martin pointed out that the prob
lem of black representativeness was only at the level of
curators:
" W e would like to appoint more black Curators.
Our education division has been generic black for a
long time. Our library is black, our admin. . . . black
... It's in the curatorial section that w e have a prob
lem, because m u s e u m work is difficult work. It's
very often boring .. . there's a whole n e w generation
of young black artists w h o are doing degrees at the
universities, but they're not necessarily interested in
working for the m u s e u m . But, having said that, if
w e had money, and we've certainly built these posts
into our Transformation budget, w e could have had
more black curators by n o w .. . With Zola w e raised
the money for his traineeship. I had no money. I got
money from the Standard Bank and then fortunately
by the time he'd finished the traineeship somebody
had resigned and w e could fill a post. But it's very dif
ficult to train and train and train people and then at
the end of the training programme there's nowhere
for people to go".31
Even with someone well-trained as a curator, however,
Martin sees no reason for restricting the area in which an
individual w h o happens to be black should work. H o w ,
to rephrase the usual question, would w e regard 'black'
curators of'white' art?
" 6 Dubow, N . (1996) Op.cit.
2 / Martin, M . (1996) Op.cit.
Kaufmann, C . (2001) Interview, Op.cit. ?9
Dubow, N . ( 1996) Op.cit.
Jane Taylor in the Dubow (1996) Interview. Jane Taylor, as noted earlier, was the incoming
Chair of the Acquisitions Committee, taking over from Dubow.
Martin. Interview with Vitus Nanbigne, University of Bergen, November 2001.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY I75
" W o u l d w e ask that question about O k w u i Enwezor,
who ' s curating Dokumenta ... the most important
exhibition of contemporary art that is held in Europe
every five years? .. . If w e want all things to be equal
and equitable, then w e mustn't isolate Africa as a spe
cial case, because then w e would have to say it's prob
lematic for O k w u i , who ' s Nigerian, to ... select pieces
for the major show in Europe. A n d w e find that per
fectly acceptable. N o b o d y has a problem."
To deny O k w u i Enwezor the opportunity to curate other
forms of work would in fact be discriminating, and dis
crimination, she argues, is to be avoided in both direc
tions:
"Because of our history, w e have only one black cura
tor ... w h o has a degree and a post-graduate diploma,
and then trained for us for two years and is n o w ,
since the beginning of the year, beginning to work
as a curator. But Zola is not necessarily interested
in classical African art just because he's black. He's
a young m a n , he's interested in contemporary art.
Carol (Kaufmann) is interested in classical African
art. So w h y must Zola do one thing and Carol can't
do another because of the colour of their skins?"
W h a t can be problematic, Martin continues, are "cura
tors w h o c o m e from elsewhere and want to dictate what
African' should be":
"I think what could be problematic, and we've cer
tainly experienced it, is that curators c o m e from
Europe, whether they're black or white ... with pre
conceived ideas about what African art should be.
These are people w h o say, for example ' O h , w e don't
want white artists, w e only want black artists, and
w e only want black artists w h o do conceptual work. '
A n d then w e say 'But black art is not that simplistic ...
and s o m e artists don't want to be called black artists.
They just want to be called artists and to be treated
like every other artist in the world' ",32
W h a t matters most, to both Martin and Kaufmann , is
that a curator be African not in the sense of colour but in
the sense of experience and sensitivity:
Martin: " W h e n I go to Senegal - I was there three
times last year - m y presence is valued as an African, as
a person w h o lives here, w h o has lived and worked on
the continent all her life and not as a black person w h o
was brought up in Switzerland and w h o can n o w go and
curate exhibitions of anything, just like everybody else.
Because that person is less African than I a m , because of
experience. Because one is not what the colour of one's
skin is, one is the colour of one's experiences."
Kaufmann: "I don't see any problems with that"
(being a white curator for African Art). "I a m a third
generation African. M y family comes from the C o n g o
and the Eastern Cape and m y father is a Xhosa speaker
... I see myself as an African and I love African art and
I love the insight, the richness it gives m e into African
cultures and the doors it opens for m e to form really
great bonds of friendship with people from all over
Africa .. . M y circle mirrors the demography of Africa
... I feel like an African ... I a m African ... it is not a
problem for m e . I a m not sure what other people's views
would be on that."
Moving Toward Critical Viewing:
Lines of Sight
O n e of the functions proposed for today's m u s e u m s is
that they encourage people to look critically at what is
presented to them, rather than accepting what they see
as 'fact'. 'Take all of this', it is said, 'with a grain of salt'.
'Think about the question: W h a t is art?' Ask: Could this
be really so?' 'Ask: W h a t techniques are being used to
produce this effect?' The processes of contest and chal
lenge need not then be episodic and draining but con
stant and easily sustained. They m a y also become part of
the perceptions of all viewers.33
Especially in situations or at times w h e n versions of
history are under challenge, it seems especially impor
tant to encourage people to look critically at the narra
tives and the images that are presented to them. H o w
far, for example, are these images of people 'accurate',
'authentic', or 'constructed' so that they encourage us
toward s o m e particular view of events? It might well be
argued that developing such forms of literacy is a criti
cal part of nation-building, in the sense that a strong
populace is one that has learned to look below the sur-
I76 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
face and is not easily gulled.
W h a t moves at the S A N G have been in this kind of
direction? The exhibitions of traditional artwork and
of photographs are certainly part of its encouraging
viewers to widen their definitions of 'art' and of what
belongs in an art gallery. A n especially explicit move
in the direction of thinking about h o w images are con
structed was the 1999 exhibition Lines of Sight.
Lines ofSight was an exhibition first held at the S A N G
in 1999 (July to October). The exhibition then travelled
to the Centre de Musée National du Mali under the title
Rencontres de la Photographie Africaine held in October
and November 2001.
Seven curators took part in putting the exhibition
together. Curator Michael Godby's section was titled
African Contrasts. The title draws on a pamphlet pub
lished in 1952 by the Public Relations Division of the
Transvaal Chamber of Mines. In it, the mining c o m
pany contrasts life on the Reserves with life in the
compounds. Juxtaposed are scenes such as " H o m e :
the interior of a native hut" with "Abroad: a room on a
gold mine", or "Primitive practice: crude surgery in the
kraal" with "Modern science: an operation in a mine
native hospital". In this manner, the pamphlet "con
trived to present the experience of labour on the mines
as a golden opportunity for supposedly primitive people
to come into contact with a technologically advanced
society".34
As Godby points out, however, "far from extending
the benefits of civilisation .. . the migrant labour system
was in fact designed to control South Africa's labour
resources ... The migrant labour system engaged work
ers from these Reserves for fixed period contracts on
the mines, at wages lower than those of urbanized Afri
cans in other industries, with no political rights and,
very often, in appalling conditions of work".35
The pamphlet and its selection of images, Godby
argues, is not alone in being "patently at odds with the
realities of African experience".36 H e then presents a
selection of other photographs that also have this qual
ity. I take as an example his analysis of work by the pho
tographer Duggan-Cronin. This photographer worked
with a number of ethnologists and anthropologists. H e
himself was an accountant on the diamond mines at
Kimberley in the early 1900's.
For all this first-hand experience of the effects of
industrialisation on the Reserves, however, Duggan-
Cronin "invariably removed all signs of industrial mate
rial culture, in the form of manufactured clothing or
implements; and he would concentrate on supposedly
typical indigenous forms, such as beadwork or leopard-
skins, to provide authenticity for his image: if his sub
jects did not have appropriate material he would supply
it himself from the stock that he carried with him".37
It was not, however, only what was in the picture that
was composed, but also what was left out:
"without remarking on the absence of m e n , w h o m
he knew to be away on migrant labour contracts,
Duggan-Cronin would create charming social groups,
particularly a wonderful series of mother and child
compositions. A n d , in his representation of agricul
tural activity, Duggan-Cronin invariably focussed
on the ideas of produce and sufficiency rather than
effort and hardship. These tendencies give Duggan-
Cronin's work a romantic, idyllic character that, even
today, m a n y people still consider a true representa
tion of South Africa's past".38
Duggan-Cronin's interests and assumptions, Godby
points out, were similar to those of anthropology of the
time:
"For example, his construction of the sense of an eth
nographic present borrows from the several interests
To take an example from an earlier chapter, one of the aims of the District Six M u s e u m is
to encourage people to think critically about all racial categories and to be suspicious of
their use in any form. Outside m u s e u m s also there is often the expectation that people will
become 'literate' with regard to the way images or narratives are constructed: a form of
learning seen as especially rapid once the people w h o were once only the objects of a cam
era come to use it for their o w n narrative purposes. See, for example, Shohat, E . and Stam,
R . (1994) Unthinking Eurocentrism, Multieulturallsm and the Media. London: Routledge or
Michaels, E . (1986) The Aboriginal Invention of Television. Canberra: Australian Institute of
Aboriginal Studies, Institute report.
4 Godby, M . (1999) "Introduction to African Contrasts". In Lines of Sight. S A N G : Cape T o w n ,
p.18.
5ibid.,p.l8.
6ibid.,p.l8.
" ibid.,p.l8.
i8ibid.,p.l8.
ibid.,pp.!8-19.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <»> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 1JJ
of anthropological enquiry, such as family groups,
homestead relations, ritual activities, etc. ... w h e n
he does depict an individual body, it is in the terms
of physical anthropology, by which he would assign
the person depicted, or the dress or adornment repre
sented, to a particular group or social context".39
D o such distortions matter? Is it important to recog
nise them? They matter, Godby points out, because they
"conceal the relationship of the African Reserves to the
migrant labour system and the South African economy as
a whole, but also maintain the illusion that the Reserves
were self-sufficient autonomous entities".40 They mat
ter as well because the "insistent denial of the process of
history had the effect, if not the intention, of maintain
ing an economic and political system that had already
developed the principal characteristics of apartheid".41
A n d they matter because, for all their falsity, the images
are appealing. M a n y are, as Godby comments, " w o n
derful". They m a y be seen also as important for build
ing up black pride: this is what w e were before w e were
destroyed. Moreover, "the introduction of colour has
added a dimension of glamour to this exoticizing style
of photography and the burgeoning tourist industry in
South Africa ensures a ready market".42 All the more rea
son then for galleries to encourage viewers to consider
h o w such images are constructed, to ask w h o is omitted
or marginalized, what assumptions lie behind them, and
what purposes they serve.
Changes Attracting Consensus
and Dissent: The Exhibition Miscast
In this section, I shall be giving major space to an exhi
bition that gave rise to considerable dissent. The gallery
and 'the public' were not of one view. I would not wish to
have it appear, however, as if the S A N G ' s moves were not
also in the direction of attracting wider and approving
audiences. Let m e start then by noting some exhibitions
that attracted approval, with one of these even involving
the people at the heart of the concern about the exhibi
tion Miscast: the Khoi-San. This selection ignores m a n y
of the Gallery's exhibitions (there are often as m a n y as 14
within a year). Those noted are chosen, however, as illus
trating some particular lines of consensus or its lack.
Examples of shared views. The first of these is an exam
ple of positive response to the Gallery's continuing to
follow an established practice, acting in the ways that art
galleries are widely expected to act. This is a 1999 exhibi
tion of Chagall lithographs. Marilyn Martin comments
that this "drew the crowds ... Thousands of people of all
colours, because it is a magical name".43
The exhibitions of 'African Art' have also moved
toward the status of shared views. There is no longer,
Martin comments, the incredulity that the first exhibi
tion of beadwork prompted ("Cape T o w n didn't k n o w
what hit it"). Even the exhibitions based on photo
graphs no longer seem strange, although "we're still
having to convince the public that photography can be
shown within the fine arts context; lots of people think
it's not really art", perhaps especially if the photographs
deal with topics such as H I V / A I D s . The role of the Gal
lery, however, is to continue to use a variety of media
(including 'new media'), gradually persuading its view
ers to regard these as 'art', and always attracting new
viewers so that both its support base and its relevance
to society increases. As several staff members in the
South African m u s e u m s remark, inclusiveness means
making m u s e u m s and museum-going part of the cul
ture of more and more South Africans. People m a y not
see m u s e u m s as 'the enemy', but if they still see them
as irrelevant to their o w n lives, they are not likely to
become audiences.
O n e of those critical audiences is certainly the Khoi-
San group (the 'Bushmen ' in an old labelling). The cur
rently-closed Bushmen diorama discussed in Chapter
3 presented an earlier example of contested displays
involving the Khoi-San people, situated in the South
African M u s e u m . Are all representations involving
them likely to be contentious?
Carol Kaufmann provides an example where that
was not the case:
"I brought rock art over from the South African
M u s e u m which was a first for our Gallery ... rock art
for m e is one of our greatest aesthetic achievements
and w e invited ... contemporary San artists from the
Kalahari to come and display their work. Interestingly
I78 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
enough, even though the work is separated by 12
000 years, or more, there is a continuity because the
motivation to do the art, and very often the spiritual
aspects - the stories or the content of the art, which
relate to deep religious beliefs - are the same. That is
the kind of thing w e do. We look at what is precious
or important for people in South Africa and we try and
exhibit that in the most respectful and participatory
way ... w e invited indigenous leaders and traditional
specialists to come and curate the exhibition with us
... W e used their o w n voices to explain the work".44
The exhibition: MISCAST. W h a t then gave rise to a lack
of consensus with regard to Miscast (its full title is Mis
cast: Negotiating Khoisan History and Material Culture)'?
Patricia Davison recalls this 1996 exhibition as "incred
ibly controversial", as eliciting "masses of views in both
directions and .. . big public forums".45 Carol Kaufmann
notes that it was "problematic for the museum". Marilyn
Martin adds further detail in two "Director's Messages"
during 1996. The first of these describes a meeting held
at the start of the exhibition:
"Nine groups of Khoisan descendants were brought
to Cape T o w n for a preview, the opening, and a pub
lic forum on the exhibition ... Neither guest curator,
Pippa Skotnes, nor staff at the S A N G were prepared
for the public interest, the intense reactions and
the controversy that launched the event. The open
ing by / ' A n g n ! A o / ' U n from the Nyae Nyae Farmers'
Cooperative was attended by over one thousand peo
ple and the forum by more than seven hundred. The
latter had all the tension, emotion and excitement of a
political meeting, and while some of the perceptions
and experiences of the exhibition were deeply painful
and disturbing for us, there was appreciation for the
bringing together under one roof of so m a n y Khoisan
descendants. The meeting raised issues around colo
nialism, dispossession, restitution of land and the
politics of history and presentation .. . W e learned a
great deal about the cultural politics of indigenous
movements, their claims and aspirations, and the
need to be vigilant and sensitive. The buildings of the
S A N G reverberated with the indigenous languages,
which few South Africans k n o w or have even heard,
and the beautiful singing of the Griqua people".46
The second of the two newsletters describes first the
increasing representativeness of the Board of Trus
tees and notes that " w e are n o w more than ever poised
and ready to function fully as the art m u s e u m for the
nation".47
That role, however, is part of what m a d e Miscast
problematic and prompted further examination by the
Gallery with regard to its responsibilities and proce
dures:
"The responsibilities attached to this role were
brought h o m e forcefully with the exhibition Miscast:
Negotiating Khoisan History and Material Culture,
curated by Pippa Skotnes. O n the one hand it gave
a great impetus to the reputation of the S A N G as
an institution of international influence and signifi
cance. O n the other hand, it offended and alienated
m a n y South Africans. Taking responses to and issues
and concerns raised by the exhibition as points of
departure, w e organised a public discussion forum -
Negotiating the Way Forward - in the Annexe Hall on
7 September. W e invited the public to engage with us
and to assist us in mapping the way forward, and it
provided m e with an opportunity of apologising to
those individuals and groups in the community w h o
were hurt and angered by Miscast. The meeting was
chaired by Crain Soudien with panellists M r Paulus
de W e t (representing the N a m a of the Richtersveld
on the Namibian border), Martin Engelbrecht
(Spokesperson for the Khoisan Representative
Council), Lavona George (member of the S A N D R D P
Forum) and Mansell U p h a m (mandated legal repre
sentative of the Griqua National Conference)".48
ibid.,p.l8.
4 1 ibid., p. 19.
ibid., p.20.
43 Martin, M . (2001) Interview. T h e remarks that follow are also from the same interview.
44 Kaufmann, C . (2001 ) Interview. Emphasis added.
45 Davison.P. (2001) Interview.
46 n "Director's Message" ( 1996) 3rd quarter.
47 "Director's Message" ( 1996) 4th quarter.
4 8 ibid.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY I79
The installation and the book that accompanied it have
attracted as well a large amount of on-line material, doc
umenting reviews of the exhibition and the book that
accompanied it, and a sharp exchange of letters between
the artist/curator Pippa Skotnes and two particular view
ers: Rustum Kozain, tutor in the Department of English
at the University of Cape Town; and Yvette Abrahams,
tutor in History at the University of Cape Town .
W h a t gave rise to all of this ferment? All m useum s
might well take note. O n e contributing circumstance
was the fact that the exhibition started with consider
able fanfare. The work itself was displayed from April 13
to September 15, 1996. The Gallery's newsletter, cover
ing Activities and Special Events, gave the dates for the
exhibition and also for two Teachers' Briefings to be
conducted in April by Pippa Skotnes. Advice was given
also on a course to be given at the University of Cape
T o w n (run by the Department of Extra Mural Studies).
The course would include both lectures and tours of the
exhibition. The topics to be covered would include:
"The question of the ethics of having anatomical
remains in m u s e u m s , the representation of the bush-
m a n body, the debate about artists as curators, gen
der and style in rock painting, recent ethnographic
research into bushmen".49
The course would cover "lectures twice a week and tours
to the exhibition". The speakers would be "chosen from
those w h o contributed to the book which accompanies
the exhibition".50 In contrast to the panel at the second
public forum, the speakers were all academics, and none
directly represented the Khoi-San.
A n d the installation itself? The comments offered
to m e in several interviews dealt predominantly with
the display of 'bodies'. These were replicas of the casts
of live bodies used in the Bushman diorama (Chapter
3). The installations, however, covered more than 'bod
ies'. For further detail, I turn to a description by Car-
mel Schrire, one of the contributors to the book Mis
cast, and one of the three contributors to a collection
of viewpoints of the exhibition in the Southern African
Review of Books.51 The detail is all the more valuable
to retrieve because it is unlikely that the exhibition will
ever be repeated, making it harder for other m u s e u m s
to ask what is likely to give rise to contrasting percep
tions and unexpected anger.
Schrire notes first that "Miscast is no quick study.
There is no immediate message to be drawn because
although illustrative quotes are accessibly scattered on
pedestals and tables, there are few explanatory texts,
and even the largest, introductory one, is posted on a
dim wall." More concretely:
" O n e enters the display through the pale, vaulted
halls of the National Gallery, past the shop, and
the massive artworks, and into three interleading
rooms. The first is almost bare. Its floor is covered
with a cream and grey linoleum showing hundreds
of photographs of Khoi-San folk and documents that
include letters, government documents, lithographs,
and even posters and flyers advertising such attrac
tions as the 'Earthman' on display in London in the
1880's for half a crown. Three antiquated cameras set
at random on the floor form a bridge to the modern
photographs that line the walls. It features images
of modern Bushmen in Namibia, Schmidtsdrift and
Kagga K a m m a , shot between 1984 and 1995, by Paul
Weinberg, and is entitled 'Footprints in the Sand'.
The second room is even more spare. It is hung
with copies of rock art made over the past century ...
All contrast sharply with the fat, clumsy watercolours
of animals and spirits, made for Lucy Lloyd by her
Bushman informants w h o patiently instructed her
day after day, in Wilhelm Bleek's house in Mowbray,
almost a century ago" (an interesting contrast to
Kaufman's pairing of rock art with work by contem
porary San artists). "Beyond this, the third room is
a dark screening chamber where images of Bushmen
and a film flicker instructively to the mournful
twang of stringed instruments.
N o w go back to the first room, turn right and enter
the main chamber ... The central display consists
of twelve brass-embellished, wooden-stocked rifles,
chained together and stacked muzzle-up around a
green flag. They rest on a small, square platform of
grey bricks, a fortress, with buttressing platforms on
four sides .. . In the corners of the fort stand four pil
lars, crowned with the fibreglass heads of Bushmen.
They are part of a study collection copied from Plaster
l80 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
of Paris live casts that were made a century ago. The
heads are pale and silvery, their delicate features
unrelieved by color or texture. They are amplified
by a semi-circle of illuminated plinths that surround
the fort, each bearing a golden image of a headless
person. Legs, a bold torso of a boy, chests of m a n and
w o m a n back to back, a supine m a n , a w o m a n at ease -
all glow soft and bright. Echoing as they do two unlit
jumbles of body parts along the dim, storage wall,
they are phoenixes, sprung bright and hopeful from
the charnel storehouse, protectively encircling the
pale heads that ring the stacked instruments of death.
Flanking the fortress are ... brilliantly lit cabinets,
where small Bushmen artefacts like rattles, carved
bones, musical instruments and pierced ostrich eggs
set in scarlet, black, and grey cabinets form jewelled
islands in a wall of grim black and white photographs
of severed trophy heads, strangulated corpses, exhib
ited curiosities, and grinding poverty. They face the
back wall, which is stacked with the paraphernalia
of scientific curation. Here are steel implements to
measure, dissect, and record, and boxes whose labels
read ' H u m a n Tissue', 'Massacre in 1673', and tell of
Jan Smuts' view of Bushmen as timeless relics. S o m e
are simply stamped 'Not for Display'.
Between the neat stacked shelves ... stand two step
ladders. Taken at their most banal, they are placed for
retrieval of the uppermost boxes. More deeply, they
also echo the object of the whole bewildering scien
tific enterprise encoded in the contents of the boxes,
plinths, and cabinets, namely the classification and
placement of exotic people".52
For Schrire, the title of the installation signals the inten
tion of recognition and warning:
"Khoisan folk have long been misrepresented, or mis
cast, as timeless people in an unchanging landscape".
So also does a banner with "huge scarlet letters" and a
quoted sentence: "There is no escape from the politics
of our knowledge". In m a n y ways, she continues, "the
exhibit lies well within the safe harbor of academic
and public discourse": discourse documenting that the
"frozen" images are a myth, at odds with the emerg
ing knowledge that "Bushmen, like most people of the
world today, have been active participants in a wider
world system for centuries." "So w h y all the fuss? W h y
the passion?"
The difficulties that Schrire sees lie in the message
not being clear, and in the display's revealing "the
dark side of the anthropological venture" and of "sci
ence", mixing "science and sorrow, archives and agony
... m u s e u m s and their tidy displays with the cold, sour
stench of the mortuary".53
These difficulties, however, are not the ones that two
other contributors to the debate see.
Some alternative views. Rustum Kozain presents the
first of these. H e was at the time a tutor and student in
the University of Cape Town's Department of English,
and describes himself as coming to the Gallery with
some doubts about the validity of some early criticisms
of Miscast: objections to whites once again representing
the Khoi-San. "I dismissed these ... as knee-jerk reac
tions. W h o , m y academic training cautioned m e , ... can
really speak for the Khoisan? W h o is Khoisan?"54
Seeing Miscast, however, was a different experience.
For him, the photographs failed to offer any n e w image
of the Khoi-San:
" H o w ... does Miscast... challenge past and (its o w n )
present representations of the Khoisan? H o w does it
say, This is how we looked at the Khoisan; here is a new
way to look?"55
For Kozain, the photographs are simply hung on the wall,
with no challenge offered to "conventional subject-object
relationships of representation". They are reminiscent of
an American Indian m u s e u m with its "fantastic yearn-
Course description available at: www.museums.org.za/sang/pub/prel977/bn96b-es.htm.
The book is: Skotnes, P. (Ed.) ( 1996) Miscast: Negotiating the presence of the Bushmen. Cape
T o w n : University of Cape T o w n Press. Skotnes was in 1996 Senior Lecturer in Fine Art at
the University of Cape T o w n .
Southern African Review of Books, Issue 43, )uly/August 1996. This includes Schrire, Kozain,
and Abraham's reviews.
~ Schrire, C . (1996) Southern African Review of Books, Issue 43, luly/August 1996. Also avail
able at: http://www.uni-ulm.de/~rturrell/antho4html/Miscast.html.
ibid.
>4 Kozain, R . (1996) In Southern African Review of Books, Issue 43, luly/August 1996.
ibid., italics in original.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY l8l
ings for absolution from the guilt of genocidal silence".
H e leaves "the first chamber of Miscast more and
more in agreement with the Khoisan activists: (feeling)
more and more as 'the exhibited', as 'the other'". To
m i n d for h i m comes the argument by H o m i Bhabha to
the effect that "it is . . . the d e m a n d that ... it (the other)
be always the good object of knowledge, the docile body
of difference, that reproduces a relation of domina
tion".56
It is then the continued maintenance of the Khoi-San
as "other", as the "docile object" of study, and the lack
of any alternative representation or reversal of an old
pattern, that are at the heart of Kozain's concern. This is
not, as advertised, any challenge to the w a y things have
always been. H e ends feeling as if he too has been m a d e
into a voyeur, reduced in his capacity to see the next
Khoi-San w o m a n he sees in other than voyeur terms.
Yvette Abrahams ' view is the last of the three pre
sented in this set (the others are by Schrire and by
Kozain). Abrahams picks up also on the lack of "any
sign of African empowerment and agency". In contrast
with what has been empowering in her o w n childhood
and family narrative, she finds here "nothing but the
Khoisan cast as eternal victims". Her concerns then
focus quickly on the plaster casts. They were "impossi
ble to miss . . . on pedestals ... carefully highlighted".57
H a d it not been for the those casts, ... the Skotnes exhi
bition would have passed us by unscathed. But those
highlighted genitals got on our nerves and are there
still."
Abrahams attended the public forum held on the day
after the opening. There "the meeting quickly came
to be about the casts ... speaker after speaker rose to
declare their offence at the exhibition of our ancestors
in such a state .. . W h a t united us .. . was our sense of
decency". Those "ancestors" were indeed factual for
some:
"The m o m e n t which brought . . . a m u r m u r round
the hall was when the m a n from Smitsdrift stood up
to tell his grandfather's stories of the time they were
taken to Cape T o w n for the making of the casts. U p to
that point it had been history to him. W h a t Skotnes
had done was to renew that dishonour in the present."
Like Kozain, Abrahams objects to "the ... inability to
see us as other than objects". That sense becomes even
stronger when Skotnes "offered to add the recording of
our protests to the exhibition ... Our deepest emotions
were to be turned into instant art. The response to our
attempt at empowerment" (asking that the casts to be
removed) "was to immediately disempower us by, yet
again, making us part of the objects on exhibit".
Abrahams contrasts that refusal with the accept
ance, by Skotnes, of Marilyn Martin's insistence that
the title "Bushman" be changed to Khoisan (an account
attributed by Abrahams to Skotnes at a University sem
inar). All told, she concludes, there is nothing here that
changes representations or conditions for the Khoi-San:
"All this would not matter, perhaps, were it not for
Skotnes' stance ... Fashions change and if the elite
today enjoy a spice of guilt, a dash of naked bodies
and some charity with their art, it really could not
matter less to us. But Skotnes' insistence that she is
doing something 'for' the Khoisan remains an irri
tant ... H o w can you speak 'for' a people you k n o w so
little about? H o w can you speak 'for' a people you do
not respect?"
Skotnes responded to Abrahams, Abrahams to Skotnes,
and Skotnes replied again58. Skotnes' main arguments
were that (1) " m y 'research subject' in this installation
was not the Khoisan, but European colonial practice
and interaction with indigenous communities, and the
legacy of this in South African museums", (2) "many
people found the resin body parts .. . extremely moving
.. . powerfully .. . communicating the h u m a n tragedy that
was tied up in the exploitation and extermination of San
people", and (3) "the right to represent or interpret" the
evidence of the past belongs to "all of us, surely, or none
of us".
Abrahams responded with a further explanation of
her objections made earlier: (1) the issue remains one of
"white constructions of social knowledge about brown
people", (2) nothing in the exhibition adds to "Afri
can empowerment", (3) "the terrain of the discourse
is naked Khoisan bodies. There is no conceivable way
they are not going to be objectified by this"; and (4) the
l82 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
best test of arguments about "rights to interpret" would
come by inverting the exhibition:
"Only when Skotnes puts her o w n face on the floor
for people to walk on. Only when she exhibits plas
ter casts of her mother's naked genitals for all to see.
Only when Brown people take the power to define
themselves and their constructions of knowledge".
Only then "are the walls going to crumble".
Kozain and Abrahams, one should note, were not alone
in their concern. From outside South Africa, for exam
ple, Kerry Ward expressed - in an often positive review
of the book that accompanied the exhibition - reserva
tions about Skotnes' response to difficulties in securing
co-operation from "the Bushmen":
"Skotnes describes her o w n difficulty in securing the
co-operation and participation of Bushmen or San
representatives in the project, revealing that these
encounters are still fraught with difficulties. But on
the issue of process and production Skotnes falls
short of analysing the ambiguous position of Miscast
itself in the contemporary identity politics of South
Africa. There is an absence of discussion about the
lack of participation by self-identifying Aboriginal
South Africans in the project. This silence is only
amplified by the eloquent attempts of other authors
in the book to retrieve those voices in the past".59
Overall, the exhibition is a provocative example of con
tested views, relevant to any occasion of a museum's rep
resentations of others and to any discussion as to w h o
has the capacity or the right to represent or interpret the
past.
E. A Highlighted Issue:
The Functions Of Museums
As in previous chapters, the final section takes up an issue
highlighted by a particular m u s e u m but relevant also to
others. The focus issue for this chapter has to do with
the several functions of mus eums . The section is divided
into two parts. The first outlines the several functions
that m a y be expected of m u s e u m s : functions that are not
always readily combined with one another. T w o are then
selected for particular attention. These are functions in
relation to viewers (are m u s e u m s , for example, to edu
cate, entertain, encourage passive or critical viewing?)
and functions in relation to the often-mentioned goal of
nation-building. For m u s e u m purposes, I suggest, that
large goal needs some unpacking, starting with attention
to the varying states and needs of a nation. It notes also
some of the ways in which they can be focal points for
contest and change.
The second part of this end-section turns to other
media. That m u s e u m s do not exist in isolation from
other media is a point m a d e in some earlier chapters
(e.g. Chapter 4). Offered n o w is a brief account of h o w
the analysis of functions for one other source of narra
tives and images (in this case, television) m a y add to our
general understanding of functions for m u s e u m s .
The Several Functions of Museums
M u s e u m s serve a variety of functions and face a variety
of goals. S o m e of these revolve around their relation
ships with other m useum s . M u s e u m s need to establish
themselves as sites marked by quality and depth, worth
borrowing from and lending to, especially at times w h e n
budgets are restricted and the best work of a period, even
The quotation is given as from Bhabha, H . (1992) The Location of Culture. London:
Routledge, p.31.
' Abrahams, Y. (1996) In Southern African Review of Books, Issue 43, July/ August 1996. The
following quotes are from the same source.
These responses can be found at: http://www.uni-ulm.de/-rturell/antho4html/Skotnes.
html.
Ward , K . African Studies Quarterly: The Online Journal for African Studies. At: http://web.
afnca.ufl.edu/asq/v3/v3i2a9.htm. The book also contains chapters by Marilyn Martin
("examining the controversy over the ownership of indigenous remains and body casts"),
and by Patricia Davison ("discussing the role of galleries and m u s e u m s in creating and
disseminating knowledge" and presenting Skotnes' aim as being to "challenge stereotypes
and evoke respect for the / X a m " ) . Carmel Schrire looks specifically at the "objectification
of indigenous peoples" represented by "the collection of heads and the particular obsession
with KhoiKhoi women ' s genitalia", with each seen as having the exercise of power . . . at its
core". Further chapters detail the history of "interactions between Bushmen and Europeans",
with one of these - by Peter Jolly - being a "discussion of the confusion and ambiguity of
ethnic classification associated with 'Bushmen ' ". Further chapters still come from several
of the people whose voices have been heard in earlier chapters in this present volume ( e.g.,
Ciraj Rassool, Leslie Witz). Kerry Ward sees the book as "the most comprehensive body of
work on the Bushmen yet produced. Although left with a lingering silence on the part of the
Bushmen themselves, Miscast (the book) is a testament to the oppression, resistance, and
resilience of these indigenous peoples".
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «x MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 183
from artists in one's o w n country, has gone to muse
u m s outside the country. Other functions revolve more
around relationships to viewers and to goals of a nation-
building kind. It is these latter functions to which I give
special attention.
A second set of functions has to do with viewers or
visitors, a third with links between m u s e u m ' s and the
nation's goals and needs, as defined by the m u s e u m
and/or by the government. It is within these sets that
the more marked points of difference and calls for bal
ancing occur and I shall accordingly focus on them.
To be noted first, however, is the fact that the several
functions m u s e u m s m a y be expected to serve do not
always fit easily with one another. Governments, for
example, m a y place more emphasis on nation-build
ing and on contributions to the economy than m u s e u m
staff m a y see as appropriate or feasible. Visitors m a y be
more interested in being entertained or in experiencing
'a pleasant excursion' combined with a little shopping
than they are in being educated or challenged. They
m a y also be less interested than m u s e u m staff m a y wish
them to be in interpreting or thinking critically about
what they see. Balancing the interests of these several
stakeholders - and their o w n - can be a challenging task.
H o w far, and in what ways, can a m u s e u m be at one and
the same time a source of pleasure, education, critical
thinking, a changed awareness of social issues, an eco
nomic resource for the country, and a base for building
a n e w identity as a nation?
Functions in relation to viewers. Art galleries especially
have a history of starting off as signs of one's civilised
status, either as a collector/donor/patron or as a viewer
w h o can appreciate 'the finer things of life'. The m o v e
into being more of a public institution with the aim of
'education' typically comes later in the day. Here, w e are
taught, are images that capture the beauty or the rich
ness of our lives and places. Here is the work of 'the
great names' : not always 'beautiful' or 'pleasing' in the
conventional sense but recognised by experts as 'great'.
"Learn their names - and recognise their works", the m e s
sage runs, "even if you don't particularly like it". In this
respect, one function often allocated to m u s e u m s - art
galleries especially - is that they will be arbiters of taste.
M u s e u m s , however, are also increasingly expected
to m a k e room for the public's preferences: for what
'the public' likes or finds interesting. O n e task then for
m u s e u m s - perhaps especially for art galleries - has to
do with finding ways to balance the notion of 'teach
ing you what the experts think' with some respect for
'lay' opinions. Sydney's N e w South Wales Art Gal
lery (to leap ahead a little) provides one example of
that balancing act. At the time of an annual exhibition
of portraits, one is selected as 'the best' by a panel of
'expert' judges (it gets the Archibald Prize). There are
as well, however, two further panels, and their selec
tions are also given prominence at the Gallery, in news
papers and on television. O n e of these panels consists
of all visitors, w h o nominate 'the public's choice'. The
other consists of the storeroom packers w h o uncrate
and hang the works. They also nominate their choice
of'best'. Sometimes these several panels m a k e the same
choices. Sometimes they do not. Maintained, however,
is the double function of showing the nature of expert
judgments and demonstrating respect for the taste of
other viewers. Gained also in the process is a heightened
interest on the part of visitors (with each ticket comes
a ballot paper) and some additional publicity, with all
three choices of 'best' being duly noted in the media.
M u s e u m s - again perhaps especially art galleries
- are also expected to offer their visitors a pleasurable
experience. W h a t happens then w h e n m u s e u m s present
material that prompts, not an undemanding visual
pleasure, but instead horror or shock? Portraits of
The Interrogators, photographs of people with advanced
AIDs , representations of famine, massacre, or the effects
of napalm bombing: these are hardly 'pleasing' in any
undemanding way. O n occasions, Kristeva argues, it
can be emotionally rewarding to experience a sense of
shock or horror: provided that one can do so from a
position of safety and of choice (the choice, for example,
of not having to look, or of being able to look away at
something else).60 For m u s e u m s , the d e m a n d and the
expected function then becomes one of estimating h o w
far, when , and for w h o m various mixtures of emotional
ease and emotional d e m a n d will work in the way one
intends.
W h a t happens also w h e n m u s e u m s present mate
rial with a text that says, "look again: this is not what it
seems", "learn to look critically and recognise that you
I84 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
can be deceived, tricked into seeing as 'real' something
that is not". The exhibition Lines of Sight at the S A N G
is a specific example, making it clear to viewers that
'beautiful' images of rural life and of mother-with-child
hid the reality of a harsh existence and of males absent
and harnessed to the demands of industry rather than
agriculture. In the world of film and television, encour
aging people to be 'literate' - encouraging them to be
interested and knowledgeable about h o w the eye can
be deceived and h o w one has been seduced into seeing
something as 'reality' - seems to be an acceptable func
tion. People m a y even be prepared to pay extra for that
information (prepared to buy, for example, not only the
video that shows what they have seen but also another
that shows h o w deceptive effects were produced).
H o w far m u s e u m s can mix that educational task with
what most visitors expect - especially when the dis
guised reality is political - appears to be more an open
question.
Art galleries and national goals. The case of the S A N G ,
and of other Cape T o w n museums, illustrates well h o w
governments can expect museums to serve a wide range
of functions. M u s e u m s should, for example, contrib
ute to the economy not simply by becoming self-sup
porting but also by building 'a cultural industry'. They
should keep their old audiences and donors but at the
same time attract new audiences - and increase their
accessibility to wider sections of the public. They should
display the productions of 'the people' but still maintain
their reputation for quality. They should think of them
selves, in the South African case, as African but at the
same time maintain their status and their connections
internationally, if only in the interests again of building
'cultural industries'. They should encourage more Indig
enous people to train as m u s e u m staff, but m a y need to
cover training costs and create positions. Throughout,
the phrase often heard is one of museums as expected to
play a part in the general move toward 'nation-building'.
H o w can w e get beyond that general phrase and link
it to some specific contributions that m u s e u m s make
or might make? As a start on that complex question,
let m e start by proposing that the first step is a look at
the 'state of the nation', at its needs and demands. Is
this, for example, a country with an established order,
an emerging status (emerging in its o w n right, for
example, after being under a colonial shadow), or a
precarious status (struggling, for example, to d e m o n
strate that there is a unity here despite the appearance
of diversity and divisions)? The several functions of
m u s e u m s , and their possible contributions, are likely to
vary with each kind of status.
Take, for example, the case of a nation where there
has been for some time an established order. That m a y
come about through the suppression of alternatives or
from the growth of conventional silences about events
that, for most people, do not fit well with the picture
they have of themselves or their country. A healthy and
competent nation, however - one capable of consider
ing alternatives - does not benefit from suppressions or
silences. Where they exist, one function for m u s e u m s
is that they can affirm the reality of what is officially or
conventionally denied or ignored. Bedford's description
of visitor interest in the painting, The Interrogators, is
an example. M a n y visitors knew w h o the people were,
even when presented under its neutral n a m e , Tryptich.
The painting then represented - in an official place - an
aspect of life that was otherwise being denied public
acknowledgment.
That kind of presentation m a y be affirming for view
ers. N o w their experience is validated. At the least, they
m a y n o w be given a less one-sided view of the world.
Meeting that function, of course, m a y not always fit
with a government's view of 'nation-building'. O n e
function of m u s e u m s , however - perhaps especially a
function of art? - is that of 'unsettling' or questioning
established views, promoting other ways of thinking or
seeing. To repeat a comment from a Trust m e m b e r for
South Africa's National Art Gallery (Dubow), he would
hope that future "Ministers for Culture" would always
find unsettling work that the Gallery had purchased,
even with government funds.
Are other functions likely to come into play w h e n
a nation has more of an emerging status? Suppose, for
example, that a country has just achieved independence
after being a colony. O r that - while still officially a col
ony - it wishes to demonstrate its o w n special qualities,
its differences from other colonies. N o w the expected
function of m u s e u m s m a y be that they will emphasise
what is not to be found elsewhere. Here, for instance,
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 185
will be showcased our flora and fauna, our artwork,
our unique style of music-making, dance, story-tell
ing. M u s e u m s m a y n o w need to establish n e w depart
ments (departments, for example, such as the S A N G ' s
Department of African Art) and to put on exhibitions
that emphasise difference (exhibitions of beadwork or
weaving, for example, that run counter to the kinds of
exhibitions that the colonising country would or could
put forward). As part of the n e w identity, m u s e u m s m a y
also be expected to contribute by playing d o w n mate
rial that emphasises colonial origins, or by making
something special out of the way these came about. To
leap ahead a little again, Sydney's usual glorification of
the difficulties faced by ships travelling from England
and of the early days of settlement in a strange and
harsh land, affirms an identity that is not the same as
that for other British colonies. So also m a y be regarded
Australia's appropriation of Aboriginal art as 'its o w n ' ,
especially in the days w h e n questions of Aboriginal
ownership or copyright were matters of silence rather
than discourse. As w e shall see in the next chapter, a
m u s e u m that wishes to modify such images of 'the
birth of a nation' must expect to face questions about
its proper functions.
As a third example of functions varying - either in
expectations or in practice - with the state of a nation,
consider the additional feature presented by South
Africa. Here is a nation with a precarious status, in the
sense that its claimed identity is one of 'diversity within
unity' but its history is one of a unity based only on the
elevation of one group and the suppression of most oth
ers. N o w the demand on m u s e u m s - placed by muse
u m s themselves or by governments - seems more likely
to take the form of'inclusiveness', abandoning past bias.
Tnclusiveness' m a y apply to what is collected or dis
played, to the audiences that are expected to be covered
or attracted, to staffing, or to the bodies that engage in
decision-making. The demand also is likely to be not
only for simple inclusion physically or in token form,
but also for equal inclusion in respect and in effective
status. M u s e u m s m a y vary in the ways by which they
meet those demands or set them for themselves, but the
expected functions and the means adopted are likely to
reflect the particular concerns with 'unity', with 'recon
ciliation', or with 'multiculturalism'.
Intersections with Other Media
Noted in some earlier chapters are reminders that muse
u m s do not exist in isolation from other media. Noted
also have been some of the specific ways in which inter
sections m a y occur:
• The images and events presented in other media m a y
shape the perceptions, feelings and understandings
that visitors bring to m u s e u m s . "I knew this about
Aborigines", for example, because "I heard it on the
radio, I saw it on television".61 "I've heard enough/seen
enough about injustices - show m e something else".
• Other media m a y compete with m u s e u m s for time
and influence.
• Other media provide a resource in practice, offering
the opportunity to observe practices that m a y be
considered, borrowed, or avoided.
• Other media m a y provide a conceptual resource,
offering further ways to analyse the nature of chal
lenge and change.
The last intersection is the one on which I wish to focus
at this point. I take as an example John Ellis' analysis
of television and its functions.62 I single it out espe
cially because at its core is the argument that television
has some particular functions: functions that reflect
the 'state of the nation' in its current need to cope
with uncertainties, choice, and a sense of isolation from
community.
More fully, Ellis starts by noting television's surface
variety. It is, for instance, a mixture of various genres,
ranging from newscasts, documentaries and travelogues
to historical dramas, music shows, and soap operas.
Beneath this mixture of education and entertainment,
however, Ellis sees television programs - 'high' or 'low'
- as unified by a single main function. This is the func
tion of offering ways to work through contemporary
issues:
"Television . . . offers multiple stories and frameworks
of explanation which enable understanding and, in
the very multiplicity of those frameworks, it enables
viewers to work through the major public and private
concerns of their society. Television has a key role in
the social process of working through".63
l86 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Ellis singles out two interwoven "major concerns". These
are the constant presence of uncertainty, and the need to
establish a sense of community in a world of increasingly
visible differences and movement .
The pressure of uncertainty and possible disorder. Ellis
sees the possibility of choice, and the precariousness of
existence, as a major source of pressures in contempo
rary society:
"The present is a precarious m o m e n t for everyone:
everything in it is mortgaged in some way to an
u n k n o w n future. In contemporary consumer-ori
ented society, this feeling is intensified. The world
seems to be filled with potential futures, only one of
which can be realised ... Choice, and the uncertainty
that haunts it, has come to pervade the present of its
society".64
Television programs, with their variety and their b o m
bardment of the viewer with dramatic changes, apoca
lyptic events, and visual effects might seem only likely
to add to that sense of uncertainty. Its very existence
m a y seem to depend on its emphasis on a changing and
uncertain present. Ellis sees television as managing to
play with both uncertainty and reassurance. O n e ways in
which it does so is by mixing closure with reminders that
more is yet to come:
"(T)elevision itself as a form tends towards the oppo
site, towards uncertainty and openness. This I believe
to be television's distinctive contribution to the con
temporary age: a relatively safe area in which uncer
tainty can be entertained, and can be entertaining".65
"Television's very use of narrative pushes them
towards an openness that in m a n y other media
would seem intolerable, or at least inept. The narra
tive organization of soap is complex because of the
number of different narrative strands that are in
play in any one episode. The narrative organisation
of drama series contains one or more strands that
reach a conclusion within any one episode, but m a n y
more that recur in different ways over the life of the
series".66
"In documentaries, too, the narrative m a y cover a
coherent incident and m a y be structured to provide
a sense of ending, but there is always more to be said.
The characters will continue their lives; the institu
tion will continue its constant adaptations to the
demands of the world outside"."7
Playing with both uncertainty and the provision of reas
surance, Ellis argues, is provided also by the viewer's
coming to k n o w the rules of each genre (the expected
formats, for example, of newscasts and soap operas) and
by coming to make viewing almost a ritual. O n the first
score:
"Crucially, television's genres, k n o w n to all, provide
stability in a system in which witnessed events of
all kinds and their interpretations ceaselessly whirl
around. The meanings change, but the formats
remain largely the same. The generic mix of a par
ticular television output is crucial in determining the
nature of its process of working through. For each
genre brings its o w n particular set of rules, its o w n
favoured modes of understanding, and interpreta
tion. Each output m a y well have a breadth of ways of
talking and explaining, of proffered forms of under
standing. But each genre has its o w n particular e m o
tional economy".68
O n the second score:
"Broadcast news exists in the same m o m e n t as its
audience, and so it has not more certainty about the
future than they do. Instead, it accompanies them
through life, allowing each individual to define their
Kristeva, J. ( 1982 ) Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. N e w York: Columbia University
Press.
"I heard in on the radio, I saw it on television" is taken from the title of a book by M a r -
cia Langton ( 1993) Well, I Heard it on the Radio and I Saw it on the Television. Sydney:
Australian Film Commission.
Ellis, J. (2000) Seeing Things: Television in the Age of Uncertainty. London: L B . Taurus,
ibid., p.74.
ibid., p.76.
ibid., p.82.
ibid., p.82.
ibid., p.82.
ibid., p.103.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 187
personal present as part of a general phenomenon:
the contemporary. This link between ' m y ' present
with 'their' present and the present of 'others' lies
behind m a n y of the rituals of news-watching, catch
ing the news nightly to confirm a sense of connected
ness which can assuage the feelings of complicity that
is part of the process of witness".69
A sense of identity and community. The comment just
quoted from Ellis underlines the second of the "major
concerns" that he sees television as helping contempo
rary viewers to work through. W e live, as he and oth
ers have pointed out, in a world where the differences
a m o n g people are increasingly visible and the sense of
being surrounded by 'strangers' is increasingly likely
despite the presence of pressure - from government or
consumers - to be 'inclusive', to give more visual time to
people w h o are not part of what used to be called 'the
mainstream'. Television, it has been argued, helps people
'work through' this sense in several ways, by:
• Creating a sense of parallel worlds. Soap operas
provide an example. "Between each episode, the
characters have lived the same amount of time as their
audience. They live life along with us, but in what
Jostein Gripsrud ... terms 'a parallel world' ".7"
• Splitting its programs or its stations so that some
can be devoted to particular sub-groups. The split
ting m a y take the form, within one station, of
gearing some programs to particular minority audi
ences (e.g. in Norway, programs in Same for the
indigenous Same-speakers, or in Australia day-time
television programs in languages other than English
for particular bi-lingual audiences). The splitting
m a y also take the form of whole stations being
developed with multicultural audiences in mind
(in Australia, for example, the television station SBS
relieves the public broadcaster A B C from the task
of offering programming specifically for minority
audiences).
Returning to Museums
Are there parallels between television and museums , par
allels that help us understand what happened within
museums such as the S A N G and, more broadly, that help
guide analyses oriented toward understanding the nature
of challenge and change?
U p for debate as a starting point is the extent to which
m u s e u m s share the same unifying purpose of helping
people work through some major concerns, especially
concerns such as uncertainty, a sense of unconnected-
ness, and possibly of complicity as a witness. The cen
tral place of these concerns is likely to vary from one
country to another or, within a country, from one time
to another. It m a y also be that the central place of these
concerns is a distinctive feature for television. Its "bear
ing witness to the present",71 its being viewed away from
the crowd, and its presentation for public viewing of
other people's distress and disasters: these m a y give tel
evision a special place.
Television, for instance, m a y promote a sense of
connectedness by way of a k n o w n audience of others,
by the ritualised nature of watching ("always the 7 p m
news" etc.), and by the sense of involvement in the
lives of the people represented (the sense, for instance,
of engagement or identification with the characters
in soap operas or weekly dramas). M u s e u m s cannot
use those same procedures. A sense of connectedness,
however, m a y well be part of the appeal of art galleries'
'block busters': the exhibitions to which 'everyone' goes.
The S A N G ' s director m a y view its Chagall exhibition
more in terms of building up its audience numbers - the
"magic n a m e " that attracted "thousands of people, of all
colours" - than in terms of 'nation-building'. The sense
of an activity or an experience shared with m a n y oth
ers, of being part of a larger group with similar interests,
m a y nonetheless be a significant part of what attracts
visitors to particular exhibitions or that is a conse
quence of their being 'one of the many ' .
M u s e u m s m a y also provide examples of h o w mate
rial m a y come to be rejected by an audience or found
to be more 'upsetting' than is tolerable. Ellis' argument,
for instance, is that television manages to offset the con
stant uncertainty of the present by staying within the
genre rules that its audiences have come to know. This
is h o w newscasts are presented, this is h o w soap operas
proceed. The one genre, however, is either not mixed
with another or done so only with caution. Art galler
ies that present material seen as totally 'ugly' or 'full of
l88 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
craft', for example, begin to bend the expected genre
rules. So also do museums such as the M u s e u m of Syd
ney (Chapter 6) when it expects visitors to be responsive
to sound that appears 'out of nowhere' and to do - for
what they see or hear - m u c h of their o w n decoding: all
this at a time when they are also grappling with add
ing complexity to their usual views of 'settlement'. The
more challenging that the presented material is for a
viewer's sense of social order, history, or identity status,
such examples suggest, the greater m a y be the need to
stay within the k n o w n rules of a particular genre.
m u s e u m m a y be expected to move toward the goal that
underlies the decision to consider three types of muse
u m s . This is the goal of bringing together a variety of
forms of challenge and change, specifying their nature
and the circumstances that promote them, in the hope
that this gathering together will both help in the gen
eral analysis of challenge and change and in providing
examples of practice that other museums m a y wish to
borrow, adapt, or avoid.
Moving Forward
The chapter that follows (Chapter 8) is the last of the
m u s e u m 'cases'. It again takes up an art gallery. Based in
Sydney and funded by the State government (the gov
ernment of N e w South Wales), it is known locally as sim
ply "The Art Gallery". The capital city for the C o m m o n
wealth (Canberra) houses the National Art Gallery, built
at a later date and not even envisaged until the original
states combined to form a Federation at the beginning of
the 1900's. Sydney's Art Gallery, however, took for a long
time a nation-oriented view. It also houses an especially
large section devoted to Aboriginal Art: The Yiribana
Gallery.
Sydney's Gallery illustrates again several issues
brought out by Cape Town's S A N G . W h a t is to be
counted as 'art'? W h a t place do Indigenous people
occupy within the gallery? W h a t involvement do they
have in the gallery's decisions about collection or dis
play? W h a t is the place or impact of commercial gal
leries? The Yiribana Gallery also raises some issues not
prominent in the case of the S A N G . W h a t should a gal
lery's position be toward the appropriation of Aborigi
nal art? Should it be presented only in its o w n section or
mixed with other forms of art? H o w m u c h interpreta
tion should be added to what is presented? Should there
be special notes or should the accompanying text be
the same as for all other works presented? The work is
clearly not all of one kind. W h a t kinds of distinctions
are appropriate? H o w appropriate or acceptable is it to
label an artist as an 'Aboriginal artist'?
In effect, the second example of a particular type of
ibid.,p.75.
ibid., p .75.
ibid., p .74.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <v MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 189
CHAPTER 8
The Yiribana Gallery: Sydney
TTHIS C H A P T E R C O N C E N T R A T E S on a
Gallery that is part of the Art Gallery of N e w South
Wales but has a n a m e of its o w n . The N S W Gallery was
begun in 1871; the Yiribana Gallery opened in 1994. M u c h
of the 'established narrative' with regard to Indigenous
art then precedes the Yiribana's opening. Its opening,
however, marked "the largest single space devoted to
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art and culture in
the world".1
There m a y be other m u s e u m s in Australia that house
in their vaults larger collections. Here, however, is an
extensive collection (albeit one with some interesting
gaps) and a large permanent display space. Its presence,
to continue the remarks of the N S W Gallery Director at
the time of the opening, is "truly in the spirit of recon
ciliation, and a clear demonstration of . . . commitment
to the art of original Australians".2
The Gallery attracts a large number of visitors, both
international and national. Aboriginal work, in fact,
n o w attracts such a level of interest that the N S W Gal
lery was able in 2000 - the year of the Olympic G a m e s
- to turn work from a particular region (Papunya) into a
'blockbuster' exhibition with a special admission fee.3
As an example of challenge and change, what makes
the Yiribana Gallery interesting? O n e feature - repeating
a feature of the M u s e u m of Sydney (Chapter 6) - is the
move toward building a differentiated picture of what
is conventionally regarded as a homogeneous 'other'.
The artwork comes from several regions. The challenge
n o w faced by the curator has to do with differentiating
among the m a n y pieces of work. There is no question
here about what represents 'Indigenous' work. It is work
by artists w h o identify themselves or are identified as
either Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. Should this
diverse body of work, however, n o w be grouped in some
way? If so, should it be by artist, by region (e.g., 'rural'
vs. 'urban', 'desert' vs. A r n h e m Land') , by the story
said to be illustrated (e.g. 'creation stories' from ' m a p
ping stories'), by m e d i u m (e.g. bark vs. canvas), or by
the explicit presence of a political message? Or should
the grouping be with other pieces of contemporary art,
ignoring the Indigenous background of the artist?
A second feature of interest is the presence - again -
of competing agendas, both among people within 'the
m u s e u m world' and between groups representing 'colo
nisers' and 'colonised'. Those contests start with what
should be in a m u s e u m at all: W h a t is valuable? W h a t
warrants collection? They continue into debate over
what should be in an 'art' gallery as distinct from an
'ethnographic' m u s e u m display. The Art Gallery of N e w
South Wales, for example, started with a recognition
of aesthetic value in the bark paintings. Serious collec
tion of these began in the 1940's by the Aboriginal Art
Department. That department was slow, however, when
it came to purchasing 'new' Aboriginal paintings: the
style n o w thought of by most visitors as 'distinctively
Aboriginal'. These purchases were in fact first made
by the Contemporary Art Department rather than the
190 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Aboriginal Art Department.
As was the case in the other m u s e u m s considered
in this volume, Yiribana also presents issues of what is
meant in practice by terms such as 'partnerships' and
'reconciliation'. 'Partnerships' appear here in relation to
questions about the nature of consultation, staffing, and
interpretation. Interpretation becomes an especially
prominent issue. W h o has the right to present or curate
the work, to interpret it if interpretation is needed, to
review it, to write about the histories or the concepts
involved? Are all these questions resolved once the cura
tors are Indigenous people and their being so is a point
of public notice?4 In contrast to the staffing situation
at the South African National Gallery, for example, the
curator of the 1994 exhibition that marked the opening
of the Yiribana Gallery was Aboriginal (Daphne W a l
lace), and the current curators (Ken Watson, Hetti Per
kins) are Aboriginal. The curator for the special O l y m
pic 'blockbuster' exhibition was also Aboriginal (Hetti
Perkins). W h a t still remains to be done, especially
from the perspectives of Indigenous artists, curators,
or writers?
The last feature to be highlighted at this point is the
presence of some particular ways of combining both
attraction and rejection, both appropriation and dis
tancing. The appropriation n o w takes the form of tak
ing over Aboriginal styles and designs, with a late rec
ognition of copyright. The first Australian $1 bill, for
example, was issued in 1966 with a design taken from
work by the artist David Malangi, not only without pay
ment but without his consent and without acknowl
edgement that it was his work.5 The distancing persisted
within the Art Gallery, in the form of insisting that only
what was 'traditional' and 'unchanging' had value. In
contrast to the position at the S A N G , work seen as "in
the Western idiom" was initially not favoured for the
Gallery although it was widely popular. (The 1940's
work of Albert Namatjira - reappraised in the 1990's and
increasingly seen as 'Aboriginal' - is a prime example).
More subtly, distancing continues in the form of cata
loguing by the letter P (for "primitive"), by displays of
the work in special parts of the N S W Gallery, and - a
recently changed practice - by the use of special inter
pretive labels, making it appear as different from the
rest of the work presented in other parts of the Gallery
and as less able to 'speak for itself.
As in previous chapters, this chapter begins with a
brief visitor's eye view, followed by a section on back
ground and beginnings and a section on 'growth' (cov
ering changes in collections and displays, and continu
ing contests). As in previous chapters also, the chapter
draws on several sources: direct observation, written
texts, and interview material.6
A. A Visitor's Eye View
From the outside, the Art Gallery of N e w South Wales is
a 'classical-style' building: large, dark and with tall stone
columns framing the entrance. O n entering, the build
ing offers a different view. Here light colours, tall ceilings
and large windows provide a more inviting space. The
Yiribana Gallery is on the bottom floor of the building
(three floors below the entrance; the building is set on a
slope). As is the case with other permanent exhibitions,
there is little text at the entrance to the Yiribana Gallery
and indeed throughout it: a break from an earlier prac-
Capon, E . ( 1994) "Director's Foreword" to the book accompanying the 1994 exhibition. This
is Margo Neale's Yiribana: An Introduction to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Col
lection. Sydney: N e w South Wales Art Gallery. The front-page notes that the word 'Yiribana'
means "this way" and "derives from the Eora language, spoken by the original people of
Sydney".
~ ibid., p.4.
This is the exhibition, Papunya Tula: Genesis and Genius. The exhibition was curated by Hetti
Perkins and was an Official Event for the 2000 Olympics Art Festival. For a brief account of
the exhibition, an interview with her is a useful source. This is in a special issue on Austral
ian Art in the magazine Look (April 2000, pp.12-15), issued by the Art Gallery Society of
N e w South Wales. Further material on Papunya art is noted later in the chapter. 4
Capon's brief opening remarks for the book accompanying the 1994 exhibition, for example,
note that the curator for the exhibition - Daphne Wallace - is "from the Gamilaroi group
of N e w South Wales" and that Margo Neale - the author of the book - is "of Aboriginal
and Irish descent". H o w , one wonders, is this kind of identification perceived by others and
by the people identified? At what point does it come to be made , cease to be, or change
its meanings?
Malangi's bark paintings were a m o n g those purchased in 1962 from the Methodist Mission at
Milingimbi (Neale, Op.cit., p.14). For more detail, see Bennett, D . H . (1980) "Malangi: The
M a n W h o was Forgotten Before H e was Remembered". Aboriginal History, 4(1).
For interview time, l a m especially indebted to Ken Watson ( Curator for Aboriginal Art, in
terviewed in February 2002). Written material covers the two sources already noted (by
Neale, and by Perkins). Worth noting at the start also are a C D - R o m on the topic of appro
priation: The House of Aboriginality produced by Vivien Johnson at Macquarie University,
Sydney. There is n o w a great deal of written material dealing with Aboriginal Art. I shall,
however, focus here on material related to the place of this work within art galleries. See,
for example, Nicholas Thomas ( 1999) Possessions: Indigenous Art/Colonial Culture. London:
Thames and Hudson.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION » MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 191
tice of placing next to a piece of work a text describing
the 'story' represented. The Gallery does, however, pro
vide more text when , in temporary exhibitions, it show
cases particular bodies of work or a particular artist.
The Yiribana space is large and well-lit with large
windows on one side. The first section, on the occasion
of a visit with no major temporary exhibition, presents
large, contemporary canvas work. Bark paintings are
found further into the gallery space. S o m e sculptural
work is found at the end of the Gallery. This includes
some contemporary work with a prominent piece being
Lin Onus ' Fruit Bats (a clothesline adorned with fibre-
glass sculptures of fruit bats decorated in 'traditional'
Aboriginal patterns and colours). The main sculptural
work on permanent display, however, consists of a set of
Pukumani Grave Posts. This set was created by a group
of Tiwi artists and is one of the Gallery's earliest acqui
sitions.
Catching the eye is the range of colours: from ochres
and browns in the bark paintings and sculptures to the
bright oranges and yellows in the acrylics of contem
porary works. Striking also is the political range: from
works with no political message to some with explicit
and biting comments on white domination and treat
ment.
Notable also is the presence of work by w o m e n as
well as m e n . Conventionally, Aboriginal artwork has
been noted as by m e n (bark paintings especially). N o w
the presence of work by w o m e n and their recognition as
major figures stands out. A n accompanying friend, for
example, says w e must be sure to see 'the large Emily'
- 'Emily' being the popular, and appropriating, term
often used by the general public to refer to Emily K a m e
Ngwarrye. Her work, usually regarded as part of'desert
art', has attracted wide attention, both by virtue of its
style and by virtue of the press regularly reporting the
high prices attracted w h e n pieces come up for auction
and the history of her starting to paint only when in her
70's: an appealing 'out-of-nowhere' narrative.
B. Background And Beginnings
The Art Gallery of N e w South Wales had its beginnings
in a story already noted for other 'colonial' museums.
The wish to establish and demonstrate local signs of 'civi
lisation' led a small group of affluent citizens to meet and
lobby the local government for an art gallery. State sup
port for acquisitions and for housing was sought from
the start. The history of the building, an archivist notes,
"reads like a sensational novel ... intrigue, personal ani
mosity and nepotism ... are all present". By 1909, the
current building emerged. O n the Trustees' insistence, it
was to be "a classical temple to art". In the hands of the
architect (Walker Versson), it was a building softened by
the use of sandstone, but still "austere and elegant".7
The first acquisitions, the archivist Miller contin
ues, were predominantly European works of the time,
and predominantly British in origin. The acquisition
of Aboriginal art did not begin in the Gallery until the
late 1940's. By then, a great deal of "colonial borrowing"
had occurred. The mixture of "native/national", T h o
mas notes, was "an unstable conjuncture, not a smooth
appropriation".8 Aboriginal objects, such as boomer
angs, and Aboriginal designs "were emblems that pro
vided settlers with a vicarious native status, and a body
of imagery wholly distinct from the visual traditions of
European cultures". There were people, Thomas contin
ues, w h o argued for the recognition of Aboriginal art as
"great art", but for the most part "the white antipodeans"
simply found appealing "the signs and styles of aborigi
nally" and happily put them to use on objects ranging
from ash-trays to fire screens.
Within m u s e u m s , collections began in two kinds of
places. O n e consisted of m u s e u m s with a mixture of
natural and cultural history and with some anthropolo
gists on the staff. It was to this kind of m u s e u m , Tho
mas notes, that in 1920 Baldwin Spencer (he had been
Special Commissioner and Chief Protector of Aborigi
nes) gave 200 of the bark paintings he had collected.9
The other site for collecting consisted of art galler
ies. Interest here began more slowly. For Sydney's Art
Gallery, for example, one sign of Aboriginal work being
seen as appropriately placed in a gallery is Margaret
Preston's 1948 gift of three sandstone carvings - by Nora
Nathan and Linda Craigie - from northwest Queens-
192 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION •» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
land. I have already noted, in Chapter 2, Preston's pro
motion of Aboriginal designs and her incorporation
of some design features into her o w n paintings in the
1940s (Thomas provides a detailed account). Her gift in
1948 is notable because it was to the Art Gallery, even
though her visits to the several communities and sites
of rock art were in the company of anthropologists.
Strong interest at the Art Gallery of N S W , however,
began with the visit of an Art Gallery staff m e m b e r (an
artist as well as a m e m b e r of staff) to a 1950 display of
work from A r n h e m Land in a commercial art gallery
(David Jones' Art Gallery). This was Tony Tuckson,
w h o later in the year became assistant to the Director
of the Gallery. Tuckson clearly saw the bark paintings
as art items rather than only as objects of anthropologi
cal interest. The same kind of conviction was also felt by
Charles Mountford, the anthropologist appointed as art
expert in a large 1948 expedition team to A r n h e m Land
(ASSEAL: The American-Australian Scientific Expedi
tion to A r n h e m Land). Mountford collected 500-odd
objects (predominantly bark paintings). These became
the property of the Commonwea l th Government and in 1955/56 were distributed to all state galleries in Australia.
The distribution to art galleries rather than stand
ard m u s e u m s , Margo Neale notes, was at Mountford's
insistence, "despite criticisms from fellow anthropolo
gists".10
For an expedition 10 years later, the team consisted
of Stuart Scougall (a private enthusiast, with a prac
tice in orthopaedic surgery), Tony Tuckson, Margaret
Tuckson, and Dorothy Bennett (Scougall's secretary).
It led to artists on Melville Island being commissioned
to sculpt the first set of grave posts for exhibition in a
Gallery - a form of artwork that Australia has come to
see as an iconic form of Aboriginal art.11 These 17 posts -
k n o w n as the Pukumani Grave Posts - were installed in
the Gallery in 1959 in the central forecourt, to a mixture
of acclaim and "wonder if the proper place for them is
... in the museum" . 1 2
In a further expedition, the same team travelled to
Yirrkala (in the region of the Gulf of Carpentaria) and
again collected bark paintings. These, plus the works
collected or bought independently by Stuart Scougall
and a further set purchased by the Gallery in 1962 from
the supervisor of the Methodist Mission in Milingimbi,
formed the major part of what Edward Capon described
in 1994 as the Gallery's collection of "classic bark paint
ings".
Then, Margo Neale comments , "the tide went out on
the Aboriginal art collecting activities of the Gallery".13
The reasons were several, but a m o n g them were a tighter
budget, concern about 'authentic' Aboriginal work, and
the lack of a curator specifically for Aboriginal Art. The
Gallery was poorly placed to respond well to a major
shift in Aboriginal art forms, emerging in the 1970's: the
forms that have c o m e to be k n o w n , variously, as 'new' ,
'desert', or 'modern' Aboriginal art.14
C. Growth: N e w Acquisitions,
Displays And Continued Contests
All m u s e u m collections are marked by both acquisitions
and gaps - occasions for celebration and for regret and
often markers for areas of contest. I note here two for the
Yiribana Gallery: the work of Albert Namatjira, and the
early work from Papunya, marking the n e w 'desert art'.
Albert Namatjira (1902-1959): O n e area for regret on the
Gallery's part has to do with the work of Albert Namatjira
and others from 'the Hermannsburg school' in the 1940's
and 1950's. Hermannsburg is the site of a Lutheran mis
sion station in Central Australia: a base where the sale
of handicrafts and artefacts had been fostered since the
Miller, S. (2000) "From Chaos to Culture: The Founding Years of the Art Gallery of N e w
South Wales". Australian Art, April 2000, pp.44-45. (Magazine of the Gallery Society of N e w
South - Special Issue).
These and the next two quoted comments are from Nicholas Thomas < 1999) Op.cit: pp.96-97.
Pages 115-143 cover his account of Margaret Preston's interest in and incorporation of
Aboriginal styles.
9ibid.,p.ll4.
1 0 Neale, M . (1994) Op.cit, p.13.
As noted earlier (Chapter 21, the year 1988 saw in Sydney the first display of 200 burial poles,
one for each year since the arrival of the "First Fleet" in 1788: an artwork commissioned
by the Australian National Gallery. Poles mark also the public forecourt of the Museum of
Sydney ( Chapter 6).
1 2 Neale, M . (1994) Op.cit., p.13.
ibid., p.14. 14
For those unfamiliar with Australian geography, Arnhem Land and the Gulf of Carpentaria
are in the top Northern sections of Australia. 'Desert' art began in various parts of Central
Australia. 'Modern' work may come from any region but, in popular terms, refers to work
on canvas rather than bark, often with acrylic colours rather than the more restricted range
of ochres and white.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ M U S E U M S IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 193
1920's and where work by visiting non-Aboriginal art
ists was visible to those resident on the mission station.
These visitors gave Namatjira encouragement in the use
of watercolours, and he began to paint central Austral
ian landscapes in what was regarded as a 'Western' style.
By the 1940's, his work was well-known. Solo-exhibitions
were held in several cities, and reproductions often deco
rated the homes of non-Indigenous Australians. Here
were trees, rockpools, hills and distances that were rec-
ognisably Australian rather than European, in colours
and compositions that - while seeming a little 'different'
- were instantly rewarding to the eye.
W h y then were galleries - the N S W Gallery included
- slow to acquire or to express interest in this work? The
answer appears to lie in the work being regarded as 'not
truly Aboriginal'. The relatively recent 'discovery' of
'Aboriginal' styles of composition and design within
his apparently 'European' landscapes appears to be the
source of re-appraisal in the 1990's.15
The adoption of a 'Western idiom' m a y have led to
inclusion in the South African National Gallery. It led,
however, to exclusion in the Australian setting, where
the established narrative was already one of 'good'
Aboriginal art as taking the form of bark paintings or
some forms of sculpture, with anything in the 'West
ern idiom' being suspect. In both cases, the Indigenous
group is separated from the established forms, and - as
well - from its o w n bases and its o w n evolving paths.
The form that this separation and marginalisation takes,
however, varies between the two countries.
The n e w 'desert art'. The Gallery's second acknowl
edged area of regret has to do with the early works c o m
ing out of the area k n o w n as Papunya.16 This work began
to appear in the early 1970's, at a time when the Gallery
was still wedded to 'traditional' work. Its 1973 exhibi
tion, for instance, designed to coincide with the open
ing of the Opera House, was an exhibition of its collec
tion of 'primitive' art.17 Change was occurring, however,
in several regions, facilitated by the Whitlam-led Labor
Government beginning in 1972 to appoint arts advisors
to several Aboriginal communities. A m o n g these was a
community based in a region k n o w n as Papunya. Papu
nya work is seen as leading the change to the 'new' A b o
riginal work, with the teacher/advisor Geoffrey Bardon
seen as the 'midwife' to its shift from body-art and work
on sand (predominantly for ceremonial purposes) to
work with acrylics on canvas.
There are by n o w several accounts of the emergence
of Papunya Art covering its diverse forms, its marketing,
its cooperative basis (some large pieces are n o w explic
itly labelled as the work of several artists), and its influ
ence on other artists.181 shall concentrate, however, on
the response of art galleries, and particularly that of the
Art Gallery of N e w South Wales.
In a word, that response was cool. The Gallery simply
did not purchase early work. In Neale's account:
"The institutionalised art world which had been fed
on a rich bark tradition was unable to re-focus on
this n e w work in acrylic paint on board. It was not
seen as sufficiently 'authentic' for purchase. It was
just too foreign or not foreign enough for the 'primi
tive art' label under which Aboriginal art was still
exhibited. Those early works from Papunya, like the
Hermannsburg School watercolours a generation ear
lier, were generally viewed by the white art world as
transitional, 'impure', and only good for the tourist
market. H o w wrong they ... were!"19
The N S W Gallery was not alone in its slowness. In Margo
Neale's account, only museums and art galleries of the
Northern Territory were purchasing desert art during the
1970s.20 Nor did the change come easily. As late as 1988,
for example, the N S W Gallery "re-opened its expanded,
redesigned and rehung Aboriginal and Melanesian art
sections". It was, at the time, one of the largest concen
trated displays with "over 200 paintings and weaponry".
It stayed, however, within the frame of "the ethnographic
shows of earlier years" and did not "relocate Aboriginal
art, for the viewing public, as a vital and distinctive con
temporary art form".21
A n e w positioning as contemporary art. W a s there then
no place in the Gallery for the art n o w emerging not only
from Papunya but also from several other regions? The
breakthrough - and an indication of other forms of con
test - came with the actions of Bernice Murphy, curator
of Contemporary Art from 1979 to 1984. Murphy insti
gated the N S W Gallery's first Australian Perspecta exhi-
194 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
bition of contemporary art, opened in 1981. In Margo
Neale's account:
"Exhibited beside the confronting conceptual instal
lations that were synonymous with contemporary
art at the time, beamed three huge ' m u s e u m pieces',
strongly coloured, extraordinarily detailed and
meticulously executed paintings by artists of Papunya
Tula. It was the first time most people would have
seen desert art on a wall, let alone in this context".22
The reception was mixed. To continue Neale's account:
"the exhibits were viewed with some suspicion, as was
desert art in general. Murphy was shocked to find that
people she least expected to be perturbed believed
that there was some sort of 'sacred divide' between
black and white Australian art. Aboriginal art
belonged 'somewhere else' ".23
That situation did change in several ways. In 1990, the
Aboriginal collection came administratively to be part of
the Australian Art Department, ending one aspect of the
"sacred divide". In 1991, the Aboriginal Women Exhibition
was a collaboration between the Contemporary and the
Aboriginal Departments. The departments of Photogra
phy and of Prints and Drawing also began to purchase
Aboriginal work. All told, the Gallery began to expand its
collections, fill some of its gaps, and prepare for the new
space and the n e w exhibition that marked the opening
of the Yiribana Gallery in 1994.
Changes in staffing. Margo Neale's historical account
also records several appointments of Aboriginal staff.
These reflect both the Gallery's interest and the c o m
mitment a m o n g Aboriginals to be themselves both pro
ducers and managers of Aboriginal artwork, although
the record in this account is simply one of a series of
appointments that were 'firsts'. In 1984, Djon Mundine
- the art advisor from Raminging - became "the Gal
lery's Curator-in-the-Field, the first time an Aboriginal
person had been appointed to a curatorial position in an
Aboriginal art department of a public gallery".24 In 1994,
Daphne Wallace became "the first full-time Aboriginal
curator to head a department of Aboriginal art in the
country". Hetti Perkins "from Boomalli Aboriginal Arts
Cooperative was a guest curator".25 All curators for Yirib
ana are n o w Aboriginal.
Did these moves then m e a n the end of contested
issues? The answer to that is 'no'. There remained - and
still remain - questions about interpretation, h o w the
work should be displayed, and w h o benefits from the
burgeoning interest in Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander work. I shall take up three of these questions.
The first asks: W h o can curate or comment? At stake
here are comments both within and outside art gal
leries. The second asks: H o w should the work be dis
played? At issue here are questions about sacred/secret
material, about places of display (both within galleries
and outside it), and about the use of interpretive texts
and labels. The third asks about the grouping, within
any gallery or text, of the diverse works that Aboriginal
art covers.
W h o Can Curate or Comment?
Within the N S W Gallery, questions about curators seem
no longer to be an issue. In contrast to the situation at
the South African National Gallery, there are n o w cura
tors w h o are professionally qualified, highly knowledge
able, committed to the area, often artists themselves, and
Aboriginal. Where there is a perceived lack has to do with
the people that visitors often encounter first-hand: the
guides. Ken Watson comments:
Namatjira's w o r k has b e c o m e so recognised that Australia Post even launched a series of
stamps with his watercolours to celebrate the 100 th anniversary of his birth. A major tour
ing exhibition of his work , Seeing the Centre, was also put together to coincide with the
anniversary.
1 6 Neale, M . ( 1994) Op.cit., p .16.
ibid., p .14 .
See, for example, Perkins (2000) Op.cit. and, a major source, Bardon, G . ( 1991) Papunya Tula:
Art of the Western Desert R i n g w o o d , Victoria: M c P h e e Gribble.
1 9 Neale, M . (1994) Op.cit., p .14 .
2 0 ibid., p. 135.
21ibid.,p.l5.
" ibid., p .15. See also M u r p h y ' s introductions to these Biennial Surveys:
Australian Perspecta (1981) (and 1983): A Biennial Survey of Contemporary Australian Art.
Sydney: T h e Art Gallery of N e w South Wales.
2 5 ibid., p. 15.
24ibid.,p.l5.
2 5ibid.,p.l34.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY I95
"The Art Gallery of N e w South Wales has 300 volun
teer guides and there is a pressure to use these. N o n e
are Aboriginal. W e used to hire someone to guide
every Wednesday but not any more. It's a financial
question really".26
(Finances apparently were what m a d e possible A b o
riginal guides for the admission-charging 'blockbuster'
Papunya exhibition in 2000).
The volunteers w h o work in the Yiribana Gallery are
given background and guidelines by the curatorial staff.
Not yet resolved, however, are the extent to which these
guidelines are followed or the potential impact, for visi
tors w h o rarely meet - or recognise - Indigenous Aus
tralians, of having comments offered by people w h o m
they identify as part of the art they have come to see.
The issue that has attracted sharper and more con
tinuing c o m m e n t has to do with w h o writes about the
work. Fourmile, for example, pointed in 1994 to the way
the reviews and comments on Aboriginal art have been
most often m a d e by non-Aboriginals. The situation
has changed somewhat since then, with the increasing
emergence of writing by people such as - alphabetically
- Bronwyn Bancroft, Brenda Croft, Fiona Foley, Marcia
Langton, Djon Mundine , and Lin Onus.2 7
Does it matter w h o curates or w h o comments on
the work? At issue is a concern that will reappear in the
section on display: a concern with the use of interpre
tive labels and texts as part of a display. W h a t is being
presented, m a n y comment , is not simply a piece of art
but also a culture (an Aboriginal culture or some form
of intersection between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal
cultures). The work is also often read as a commentary
on a culture (a categorisation as 'primitive' is often
a c o m m e n t both on an artist's style and on the group
that the artist is seen as representing). The two - art and
culture - m a y not only be especially difficult to separate
within Aboriginal art. They m a y also have special inter
connections.
In m a n y Aboriginal works, for example, what is
being presented is not simply a work of art but a way of
being, a view of oneself, of the land, and - often - of the
white 'other'. In effect, what is being read into the work
by the viewer, especially the non-Indigenous viewer, is
a view also of the artist's culture. Here, the catalogues
and gallery texts often comment , are depictions of
narratives that account for h o w the land was formed
and h o w customs and rules were established. Here are
people, the catalogues often comment , w h o paint in
'primitive' conditions and were thought of as a 'dying
race' (one of the reasons for the expeditions to collect
bark paintings). Here is an artist, to take again the
often-cited example of Emily K a m e Ngwarrye, w h o had
never touched a paintbrush until her 70's, w h o has cer
tainly never gone to art school, and yet takes the world
by storm. N o w out of some apparent 'nowhere' comes
work that is dazzling, highly sophisticated, distinctive
but at the same time highly inventive. Part of the visi
tors' interest then lies in what the work says about the
cultural context from which it emerges.
Hetti Perkins (curator of the 2000 Papunya exhibi
tion) adds a further point. Aboriginal work is n o w often
understood as presenting stories or beliefs about the
way the world was, as 'old' stories or beliefs that do not
apply to the way one lives today. She offers instead the
view that:
"It's not just a set of beliefs from the past, it's a set of
beliefs that are a dynamic part of contemporary life
... the core of today's society."28
A similar type of commen t is made by a Warlpiri w o m a n
commenting on paintings by a Warlpiri artist, Dorothy
Napangardi, whose work has also been featured in Syd
ney exhibitions. These paintings, Punayi Nungarryi c o m
ments, stem from a tradition of w o m e n dancing as they
travelled the country, trading and engaging in exchange
ceremonies (the exhibition's title is Dancing Up Country).
They are also "paintings of her Jukurrpa", a term that
refers not only to a set of narratives but also to:
"an all-embracing concept that provides rules for liv
ing, a moral code, as well as rules for interacting with
the natural environment, the philosophy behind it is
holistic - the Jukurrpa provides for a total, integrated
way of life ... the dreaming isn't something that has
been consigned to the past but it is lived daily reality.
W e , the Arlpiri people, believe in the Jukurrpa to this
day".29
196 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION » MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
That kind of viewpoint gives a particular push to insist
ing on the right to be at least part of 'the interpretive
process', if not the major source of interpretations, w h e n
it comes to Aboriginal art. For the m u s e u m hosting the
exhibition - Sydney's M u s e u m of Contemporary Art
- recognition of that claim came in a form that other
museums might also adopt. The catalogue contains, as
one would expect, comments by the curator, Christine
Nicholls. It contains also, however, the introduction just
cited by a Warlpiri w o m a n , a commentary by Djon M u n -
dine O a m , and - a novel step - brief comments on the
artwork by three other Aboriginal w o m e n , artists from a
different region.
How Should The Work Be Displayed?
This section, as noted earlier, covers a variety of issues. I
begin with one that has come up in earlier comments on
the display of bodies and of secret/sacred materials. This
is the issue of restricted viewing.
Restricted viewing. Restricted viewing is noted for
Yiribana as one aspect of partnership. To take a 1994
statement of policy:
"The provision of a special place for restricted objects
is one of the n e w directions to be taken by the
Yiribana Gallery. It is an attempt to address the issue
of the proper display of significant objects that are
not totally restricted and need not be relegated per
manently to the storerooms of institutions. It thereby
makes an important point about the place of con
sultation with the communities from which these
objects came. This display publicly recognises the
continuing significance of these objects to Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander communities and is a
declaration of a partnership role in which c o m m u n i
ties retain ownership rights whilst the Gallery per
forms a guardianship role".30
That general principle, of course, leaves open questions
about the nature of partnership, about varying percep
tions of the ownership/guardianship roles, and about the
return of material to communities, either for local dis
play and access, or for possible destruction. Less equivo
cal is the interpretation of 'partnership' as covering con
sultation on the naming of artists w h o have died and on
images them. Permission is n o w sought for such n a m
ing and, until it is granted, these names and images are
removed.
Positioning within a gallery. Where in a gallery should
work be placed? O n the one hand, Aboriginal art is art in
its o w n right, regardless of whether the artist is from one
national or regional background rather than another. O n
the other hand, it is a matter of some pride that the work
is given specific recognition as Australian art and, still
more specifically, as Aboriginal art. That recognition is
important not only to m a n y Aboriginals but also to visi
tors. Visitors - overseas visitors especially, it seems - often
come to the Gallery with the particular aim of seeing
'Aboriginal art'. For them, finding the work concentrated
in a particular section of the m u s e u m is both convenient
and expected.
For the m o m e n t at least, the best solution - the one
n o w accepted - seems to be some mixing of Indigenous
pieces with other work in the first halls to be entered,
and then a separate dedicated space. Should that space,
however, be - as it currently is - at the far end of the
building? Ken Watson's preference is for it to be the first
to be encountered, meeting "a criticism w e have had
from a number of people":
"The Aboriginal section is on the ground floor, two
flights d o w n from the main entrance. I would like to
see the Aboriginal works be the first you see as you
enter the building but I think the Gallery put the
works here as they are so popular. They would like
the visitors to go through the whole building before
coming to the Aboriginal section. Otherwise people
Ken Watson in interview with the author February 2002.
Fourmile, H . (1994) "Aboriginal Arts in Relation to Multiculturalism". In Gunew, S. and
Rizvi, F. (Eds.) Culture, Difference, and the Arts. Sydney: Allen and Unwin. One source for
commentaries by Aborigines is Munidine, D . and McNeil, D . (Eds.) (1992) Aboriginal Art
in the Public Eye in Australia. Canberra: Australian National University (Arts Centre).
Statement in interview, Look, Op.cit., p. 18.
Nungarryi, P. (2003 ) "Introduction to the Catalogue for the Exhibition: Dancing Up Country
- Works by Dorothy Napangardi". Sydney: Museum of Contemporary Art.
Neale, M . ( 1994) Op.cit., p. 11.
Ken Watson in interview with author, February 2002.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 197
m a y come only to see the Aboriginal works and noth
ing else".31
Interpretive labels and texts. W h a t information should
accompany the art pieces? By now, m a n y viewers of
Aboriginal art have come to expect that each painting -
on bark or canvas - 'tells a story' and that each will be
accompanied by a brief description of'what the painting
is about'.
For curator Ken Watson, that is not the way to dis
play the work. His reasons are several:
" O n e is that w e are not really sure that the story w e
have been told is the real one, or simply one that has
been told to satisfy a certain listener. A second is that
some of what w e have been told might not have been
meant for a broader audience .. . perhaps too m u c h
was told and the text n o w covers material that was
meant to be for a restricted audience."
"It detracted from the art works themselves. The
visitor would go from label to label reading the sto
ries behind the paintings and not really see the work
itself."
Distraction and possible inappropriateness, Ken Watson
continues, apply also to putting with the paintings
accounts that detail historical change - accounts that
describe, for example, the move to acrylics:
"There is information about that in the m u s e u m shop
or they can ring us and find out more if the visitor
wants to k n o w more. W e don't see it as necessary.
This is an art gallery not a m u s e u m . "
Visitors, however, often seek some on-site information:
about the painting, the artist, or the context in which the
work was produced. It m a y also be argued that to present
the work in 'decontextualised' fashion reduces the view
er's understanding of the work, the culture, and the sig
nificance of the work as a cultural statement. For A b o
riginal artists, that second reduction m a y be not simply
a loss but also a denial of their intentions and, in the end,
a further lessening of the significance of their culture in
a 'colonised' land.
N o single way of resolving this issue stands out. O n e
possibility is the placing of some interpretive text at a
distance from the works themselves (not one piece of
text tagged on to each work). Another m a y be text m a d e
available by way of audio tapes, although the latter also
leave the viewer open to spending more time listening
to the account than responding to the work as art rather
than illustrated narrative.
How Should Work Be Grouped?
Aboriginal work is diverse. Even what is often regarded as
a single group (Papunya art is one example) is extremely
diverse. Should Aboriginal work then be grouped in
some way? If so, h o w should it be grouped? O n what
bases? O n this score, even this one gallery yields more
than one approach.32
Groupings at the level of cataloguing. O n e form of
grouping is behind the scenes, in the Gallery's catalogu
ing. Ken Watson comments on the P for 'primitive':
" W e have been trying to get the P serial number off
the numbering of the works but have so far been
unsuccessful. Simply removing it doesn't work as
there are other works that share the number, with the
P on the Aboriginal works marking the difference."
Groupings in public space: The 1994 solution. The more
visible aspects of grouping are those in the public space.
S o m e conventional ways of grouping were rejected by
Margo Neale for the 1994 opening. Rejected, for example,
were groupings in terms of 'traditional' versus 'non-tra
ditional' or 'rural' versus 'urban':
"'Traditional' does not m e a n something old and
unchanging - a static art form which is simply copied
into the present for nostalgic or other reasons. Nor
does 'urban art' m e a n that the artists w h o work in
'non-traditional' styles have no cultural traditions or
that they necessarily live in cities or towns. They are
both contemporary art practices."
Rejected also was a grouping by region:
"It is increasingly anomalous to locate Aboriginal art-
I98 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION '•»• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
ists regionally in an art world that does not define
non-Aboriginal artists primarily by region or resi
dence."33
Neale's solution is to group partly by time but primarily
by theme. The 1994 exhibition began with the theme A
Collection Begins:
"(B)ecause the .. . collection ... predates the rise of art
from the desert and from towns and cities as w e k n o w
them today, it seemed appropriate to c o m m e n c e the
tour with the theme, A Collection Begins, a section
containing sandstone carvings and bark paintings
(or bark designs on paper). Similarly, the final theme,
Claiming a Space - which contains mostly 'urban' art
with few barks - parallels collection practices and the
diversification of art production over the past dec
ade".34
The five sections in between took up, respectively, works
focused on creation themes {Land Before Time), "spirit
beings which inhabit the land and the water" {Spirits
of Place), "ancestral journeys" {Land Maps), "spiritual
power" {Shimmer), and "things associated with death"
{Sorry Business). A n y one of these sections might then
juxtapose - as dealing with essentially the same theme -
an old bark painting with one on canvas, in acrylics, dif
ferent in style, and produced several decades later.
Neale adds the c o m m e n t that the grouping is "a per
sonal view", "intended to introduce the reader to n e w
ways of seeing a rich and complicated collection".35
Its personal quality is certainly underlined by Ken
Watson's reaction: " W h e n I first came here the gallery
space was divided into six sections ... That was one of
the first things to go."
For Watson, display positions should be flexible and
based on aesthetic grounds, paralleling principles used
in relation to non-Aboriginal work. The work needs to
be responded to in its o w n right, with the viewer first
taken by its aesthetic qualities and only then seeking
information about its 'story' if that is felt to be a way of
adding to the delight of the work as it is viewed.
Hetti Perkins (Curator of the 2000 exhibition - Papu-
nya Tula: Genesis and Genius) adds a further curator's
view. The work is constantly changing, she points out,
so that any attempts at a fixed or frozen grouping can
not last:
"The Papunya Tula M o v e m e n t is constantly reinvent
ing itself in each generation. O n e of the great things
in recent times is the emergence of w o m e n artists.
They hadn't played a very public role but they've
been there all the time, which perhaps explains w h y
they've suddenly flowered as this powerful force in
the community".36
O n e aspect of Neale's 1994 grouping, however, feels effec
tive to this reader of her account. It did bring together
- in its last section covering recent work - several pieces
that are easily read as criticisms of white Australian cul
ture and its treatment of Aboriginals. O n e of these is
Richard Bell's Devine Inspiration, with its alphabet:
"Abos Blacks Coons Darkies Expecting Free Gifts Here
In Kindness Justice Land Moderation Not Offered
Peacefully Quickly Resourcefully Sincerely Tactfully
Under Very W e a k Xenophobic Yobbo Zookeepers."
A second is Bronwyn Bancroft's You Don't Even Look
Aboriginal: a mixture of 'traditional' patterning and pho
tographs or drawings making a genealogical statement.
A third is Gordon Bennett's Myth of Western Man, in
which a web-like structure is hung with dates surround
ing a central 'explorer' figure. The dates, and the paint
er's accompanying text, provide an Aboriginal timeline,
starting from 1788 and 1795 (first legally sanctioned
massacre) to 1976 (Truganini's bones cremated and her
I set aside the several discussions within the art world as to whether Aboriginal art since the
1970's is 'derivative', 'completely new', 'post-modernist'. The focus here is on gallery group
ings, although the two sets of categorisations are not unrelated,
Neale, M . (1994) Op.cit., pp.7-8.
ibid., p.10. Bark paintings were sometimes on paper for the convenience of collectors, paper
or cardboard being easier than bark to carry back.
Neale, M . 11994) Op.cit., p.ll. It is indeed startling for m e - in the book's illustrations - to
see juxtaposed a bark painting by Dawidi Djulwarak ( The Wagilug Sisters' Myth), a painting
by Ginger Riley of Limmen Bight Country, and Trevor Nickolls' Garden of Eden with its
"mixture of Byzantine and Aboriginal . . . imagery", juxtaposed because they are all 'creation
stories'. They are, but for m e the juxtaposition on this basis alone felt strange. It was as if all
paintings dealing with the M a d o n n a and child were grouped together.
Statement in interview. Look. Op.cit., p.15.
Truganini, regarded as the last Tasmanian Aboriginal, died in 1876. Her skeleton was put on
display, against her expressed wish, in the Tasmanian M u s e u m .
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ov MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY I99
ashes dispersed to the wind) and 1992 (Mabo case on
land rights is won) . 3 7
All three feel as if they belong - at one level - with
each other and with other paintings that m a k e a clear
attack on the injustices and indignities that are part
of Aboriginal experience and that reflect continuing
aspects of White Australia's approaches to its Indig
enous population.
A further view of grouping. H o w else might the work
be grouped? Consider the grouping offered in the Edu
cation Kit for the Yiribana Gallery: aptly titled Diversity:
A Celebration of Art and Culture.™
This kit notes at the start that the art and the cul
ture belong together. The art reflects "the fact that A b o
riginal culture is symbiotic with the land. W h e n asked
what it is that the artist paints, the reply is often: My
country".39 M u c h of the region-to-region variation then
reflects the visual qualities of the local landscape (sea,
grasses, trees, sand, living creatures) and the stories
associated with these. It also reflects the intention of the
artist to claim the landscape as theirs, as deeply m e a n
ingful and as intrinsically connected to issues of kin
ship, law, belonging-ness, and religion. It m a y reflect as
well the intention of the artist to "teach the world about
m y culture"40: promoting understanding and respect,
documenting land rights, commenting on what coloni
sation has done and continues to do to that culture.
The Education Kit then starts by considering "diver
sity of country", linking geography and meaning to a
variety of landscapes. This is followed by sections on
"diversity of creation", concentrating on images of the
Rainbow Snake with its power and - a return to the
theme of land - its being "synonymous with water, rain
and flooding".41
"Diversity of Style" provides the next slicing, with a
contrast between several ways of presenting one's o w n
landscapes (contrasted are a 'central' landscape of rocks
and water by Albert Namatjira (in what was once seen
only as a 'Western idiom') and a sea and sky painting by
Ginger Riley Munduwalawala that mixes 'traditional'
motifs with a vibrantly colourful, 'contemporary' style.
"Diversity in Death" is the next theme, noting variations
from cremation and burial to the several forms of grave
posts. Again a connection both to the land and to the
belief system is noted. The posts in the Yiribana Gallery
(the "Pukumani posts") are from logs hollowed-out by
termites: the placement of bones in the logs is one part
of ceremonies that allow the spirit of the deceased (in a
theme that cuts across m a n y societies) to leave its fam
ily and rejoin the world from which it once came.
The sections that follow cover "Diversity in Gender
Roles", with the text noting differences in activity and
in knowledge and the way these appear in particular
paintings (paintings by A d a Bird Petyarre and Emily
K a m e Ngwarre provide the examples), and "Diversity
of Voices". Here are the 'new voices' of artists such as
Gordon Bennett, Bronwyn Bancroft, and Lin Onus : "as
diverse in their concerns as they are in their personal
styles", but united by their commenting on the inter
connections - often unhappy - between Aboriginal and
non-Aboriginal society.
The Kit ends with a note - appropriately placed before
its set of reproductions - on "copyright and Indigenous
intellectual property" and on what students m a y not
copy and present as "their own" . The advice is a direct
response to the challenge: H o w can one teach respect
for this form of art and at the same time not distance it
by making it completely untouchable?
"Copyright ... has become a sensitive issue, requir
ing commercial and cultural respect. The study of
Aboriginal art is encouraged for reference, inspira
tion and understanding for all Australian students.
The artistic expressions of m a n y Aboriginal artists
stamps of cultural identity and contain spiritual and
environmental knowledge pertaining to a particular
language or kinship group. It is therefore inappropri
ate for others to directly copy symbols and designs
of personal or national identity and present them as
their o w n . However, inspired variation, incorporating
a student's individual style and story, is encouraged
(e.g. making designs or maps to interpret environ
ment, weather patterns or spiritual beliefs; painting
on the ground with an aerial perspective). Aboriginal
students are not permitted to use designs which are
not related to their ancestral or language group".42
The student is then referred for further information to a
publication that is specifically about copyright and that
200 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <v MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
draws attention to the exploitation and misuse of A b o
riginal designs: a new version of a Gallery's educational
function. This is the publication Copyrites: Aboriginal
Art in the Age of Reproduction Technologies by Vivienne
Johnson.43
Does the work need to be classed as 'Aboriginal' at all?
"From time to time", Daphne Wallace comments, "as part
of the reconciliation process, non-Aboriginal works will
be shown along with Aboriginal works", in ways that pre
sumably return to Bernice Murphy's first positioning of
Papunya work in a contemporary art exhibition.
More strongly still, there is - a m o n g artists w h o are
also Aboriginal - no single view about grouping. Lin
Onus , for example, comments:
"I have been regularly asked to which school or
movement do I belong? Apart from some obvious
responses .. . I guess that what I would have to say is
that I belong to the Bower Bird School. You k n o w the
one ... picking up bits and pieces, here and there".44
A stronger position still is expressed by Tracey Moffatt
(photographer, film-maker), in the form of a refusal to
participate in exhibitions with labels such as 'Aboriginal'
or 'Black'. In a published exchange of letters with Claire
Williamson, for example, she responded as follows to an
invitation to take part in an exhibition of photography
that would explore issues of'cultural identity':
"I 'm afraid I can't be part of the exhibition ... I have
made a point of staying out of black and 'other' shows
... I want to be exhibited in Contemporary art spaces .. .
I have avoided allowing myself to be ghettoed as a
B L A C K artist ... Black art keeps black artists in their
place. I refuse to be kept in m y place. I could never
progress as an artist if I did".45
Moffatt's statement parallels that of Ken Watson: "It's
important to get Aboriginal art out of the box."
Galleries clearly need to balance competing interests.
O n the one hand is an interest in respecting the wish
not to be placed 'in a box'. O n the other is an interest in
becoming k n o w n for the size and quality of their col
lections of 'Indigenous' art and in meeting the interests
of visitors w h o come to the Gallery specifically to see
those collections and, perhaps, to 'learn more ' about
Aboriginal culture.
D. A Highlighted Issue: Self A n d
Other In Theory And Practice
At the end of each m u s e u m chapter, I have taken up an
issue highlighted by the m u s e u m s considered but rel
evant to m a n y others. These issues help to delineate the
general nature of challenge and change. They also raise
questions about m u s e u m practices and about possible
ways forward. Over the several chapters, these issues have
covered:
• the place and significance of bodies (Chapter 3),
• the nature and impact of representations in other
media (e.g. film or television) (Chapter 4),
• the presence and the translation into practice of some
pervasive concepts (those chosen had to do with
narrative and m e m o r y ) (Chapter 5),
• the matching of m u s e u m expectations with those of
multiple audiences (Chapter 6),
• and the several functions of m u s e u m s (Chapter 7).
Sydney's Yiribana Gallery brings to special prominence
an issue that has surfaced in earlier chapters and is again
relevant to m u s e u m s beyond those considered. This
issue has to do with the nature of representations of
self and other and with the distinctions drawn between
them: distinctions that some groups seek to establish
and maintain and that others challenge and seek to undo.
This 1999 kit was prepared by Angela Martin, "in consultation with the N S W Aboriginal
Educational Consultation Group Inc." and two Museum Educators in the Schools sector
(lennifer Keeler-Milne and Jo Foster).
(1999) Diversity: A Celebration of Art and Culture. Education Kit. Sydney: Art Gallery of
N e w South Wales, p.2.
40
Statement attributed to Michael Tagamarra Nelson.
ibid., p.5.
4 2 ibid., p.ll. 43
Johnson, V . (1996) Copyrites: Aboriginal Art in the Age ofReproduction Technologies.N.l.A.A.A. and Macquarie University.
44
Statement in 1991, cited in Nea le .M. (1994) Op.cit, p.116.
Moffatt, T. ( 1992) The exchange of letters was reproduced m Eyeline (autumn issue). Moffatt
is perhaps best k n o w n - outside art gallery circles - for films such as Night Cries.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION «" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 201
That issue has surfaced in several chapters.
Chapters 3 and 4 , for example, raised this issue in
terms of the several ways in which Indigenous peo
ple could be classed as 'other' within natural history
m u s e u m s . They could, for instance, be presented as
irrelevant to modern life (as part of a past, as living
rural lives in remote areas, as simple in thought and
action). They could also be presented as objects of study
rather than as active subjects: people whose narratives
needed to be told for them. W h e n the conventional self/
other divide was broken, it could easily be at the cost of
losing one's identity ("ah, you are really just like us") or
of being simplified by n o w being given a n e w but still
essentialised image (all passive victims, for example, or
all resistance heroes).
Chapters 5 and 6 brought out some further ways of
creating a self/other divide. The 'other' in historic-house
m u s e u m s , for example, could easily be m a d e invisible
or written out of m e m o r y (no record of their presence
in these houses, for instance, no houses left standing in
these areas). Chapters 7 and 8 have added some further
ways of maintaining the divide, with the positive quali
ties still on the side of 'self. N o w Indigenous work m a y
be regarded as 'craft' rather than 'art', as material for
commercial galleries, or as valuable only w h e n it sticks
to a 'traditional' form, reserving the right to evolve and
invent to one's o w n artists.
Each of these attempts to create and maintain a self/
other divide, w e have seen, has also led to challenge and,
in m a n y cases, to change. In m a n y ways, the form that
challenges and changes have taken in various situations
reflects the particular ways in which the Indigenous
'other' has been pushed to the less positive side of a self/
other distinction.
The time is n o w ripe to ask if w e can begin to pull
together m u c h of this material on self/other categorisa
tions and divides. I shall do so in two steps. The first
presents some conceptual proposals about self/other
distinctions. The focus is on proposals about aspects
that promote tension and challenge. The second is more
closely geared to questions about what m u s e u m s can do.
The focus here is on the need to recognise and anticipate
the push-and-pull quality of moves toward maintaining
and undoing divides. Those moves are illustrated by
moves related to 'Aboriginal art' and 'Australian art'.
Self/Other Distinctions: General Proposals
Self-other distinctions m a y be on the basis of several
dimensions: class, skin colour, gender, age, religion,
region, history, or assigned position on some ladder of
evolution or progress. In some form or other, these dis
tinctions seem to be at the core of social life. Their being
central to social life, however, would by itself add little to
the understanding of challenge and change. Toward that
goal, however, w e can benefit from some proposals made
outside the world of m u s e u m s .
Several of those proposals m a y be found in the work
of Julia Kristeva. To reduce these to a simplistic form,
Kristeva argues that the sense of stable borders between
self and other is essential to our sense of social order,
of a world that is "propre" in the sense of being both
clean and as it should be. For that reason, w e put work
into the maintenance of borders. W e feel disturbed and
uneasy w h e n an element from 'the other side' is placed
next to what belongs 'on this side', or w h e n it looks as if
there is some 'leakage', 'contamination' or 'blurring' of
borders.
At the same time, w e view the 'other' with a sense
of both danger and some fascination. W h a t is 'foreign'
can also be 'intriguing'. W e m a y then seek some con
tact with what is other, preferably in the form of short
encounters or brief excursions into the other's world,
provided that these can be carried out in safety, without
threat to the stability of the usual borders, and with a
guarantee of return or of being able to look away when
'time out' is needed.46 The packaged foreign tour, to
extrapolate that argument, makes an ideal safe excur
sion, with perhaps the extra spice of carefully super
vised exposure to what most tourists do not see. A m o n g
the tours on offer in Cape T o w n , to take one example,
are those that offer carefully supervised exposure to
'the other side of Africa', starting with the District Six
M u s e u m and moving on to some of the townships on
the fringe of the city. The people w h o represent the
other, however, often remain as people to be 'looked at',
rather than truly encountered.
Kristeva's work also draws attention to the several
ways in which divisions and borders m a y be main
tained. O n e way, for example, is by establishing physi
cal distance. At a national level, she notes, people m a y
202 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*> MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
be required to live in particular regions, with passes
required to m o v e from one to the other or with legal
restrictions on their purchase of houses or their entry
into particular schools or occupations. More seman-
tically, they m a y be set at a distance by being labelled
as 'alien', as 'foreign', as 'strangers': terms that m a y be
applied to people from other countries or to fellow-
nationals w h o were simply not born in a particular
region. Physical distancing m a y also be seen in muse
u m s . The other's history, for example, m a y be placed
in a m u s e u m that emphasizes fossils. In contrast, our
o w n is placed in a m u s e u m with 'classical' Greeks and
R o m a n s - 'early' but clearly civilized (Chapter 3). The
other's art m a y be excluded from what is displayed in
'true' art galleries, kept in its 'proper' place by being
regarded as belonging in commercial galleries, shop
ping malls or street sales (Chapters 7 and 8). More sub
tly, the other's art m a y be collected and displayed, but
restricted to a particular part of a m u s e u m and treated
in a way that differs from the way art is treated in other
sections of the m u s e u m (the present chapter).
Less physically, distance m a y be established and
maintained by placing the other and the other's work
into restrictive categories. They and the work they
produce m a y be assigned to a type that is both differ
ent from and lower in level than one's o w n ('primi
tive' art), or that allows it no room for inventiveness or
change. This and only this, for example, is 'Aboriginal'
art: anything outside the 'traditional' form does not
belong. Only bark paintings, to take an example from
the present chapter, are seen as truly Aboriginal art.
Paintings on canvas or paper in 'the Western style' are
not. Paintings on canvas or paper with acrylics in the
'dot' style are at first not Aboriginal. Later, only these
are 'modern Aboriginal'. O u r o w n art, in contrast - like
our science and our ways of living - is seen as continu
ously evolving. In similar fashion, people w h o are 'other'
m a y be seen as 'all alike', ignoring the presence a m o n g
them of groups that do not see themselves as identical
and, within any group, differences a m o n g individuals.
That issue was especially visible in Chapter 6, where the
M u s e u m of Sydney took several steps toward undoing
that typing by recognising diversity a m o n g the A b o
riginal groups within a single region and by recognising
individuals within these.
Where do such restrictive steps leave the artists des
ignated as 'other'? The proposals noted up to this point
have emphasised the actions of 'self, with 'self refer
ring to those in a position of relative power w h e n it
comes to decisions about what will be counted as 'good',
'acceptable', 'valuable', or 'genuine'. Each side, however,
has views of the other. Moreover, those placed on the
less positive side of a divide are not passive.
The whole concept of contest and negotiation, in fact,
is based on the notion that distinctions which privi
lege one group and disadvantage another will not be
accepted passively. The interesting questions then are
not restricted to the ways in which one privileged group
puts up barriers, maintains these and enjoys occasional
safe excursions 'outside', returning with souvenirs or
with appropriated styles. The questions must also have
to do with the way people in a less privileged group resist
the categories in which it is placed. They m a y do so in a
variety of ways. To take some examples from Chapters
7 and 8, they m a y refuse to accept a classification (e.g.,
refuse to participate in exhibitions of'Black' art). They
m a y turn to other sources for acclaim or for support
(e.g., to commercial and overseas galleries). They m a y
seek to redefine the bases of expertise w h e n it comes to
decisions about what will be collected and h o w it will
be displayed (redefine, for example, by claiming special
knowledge, the rights of ownership to interpretation, or
the need for redress and social justice in representation
a m o n g the decision-makers).
Self/Other Dynamics in Museum Contexts
The kinds of proposals that theorists such as Kristeva
offer m a y not seem immediately relevant to m u s e u m
settings and practices. To bring that relevance out more
clearly, this section outlines h o w some competing forces
will always contribute to the presence of tension. That
tension m a y be potentially productive rather than always
disruptive. M u s e u m s m a y in either case benefit from
anticipating its presence and its shape.
I shall frame the tension brought out by this chapter
See, for example, Kristeva, J. (1982) Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection.
N e w York: Columbia University Press.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 203
in the form of moves in the direction of no divide, and
moves in the direction of a divide between 'Aboriginal
art' and 'Australian art'.
Moves and influences in the direction of no divide.
T w o of these m a y be noted. O n e appropriates Aboriginal
art as 'distinctively Australian'. The other places it, with
out concern for origin, as simply contemporary art.
Moves of a 'takeover' kind are certainly widespread.
Within Australia, Aboriginal art is n o w seen in a variety
of places. It is, for example, almost a compulsory item
for every boardroom of any status. Commercial inter
ests also add their weight, promoting some forms of
Aboriginal art as icons of Australia. I take as an exam
ple the external painting of a Qantas plane. Qantas has
always signalled its 'Australian' identity by the kangaroo
on its tail-fin. It n o w has the exterior of one of its Boe
ing 707's completely painted by a n a m e d Aboriginal art
ist in a recognisably Aboriginal style. The text accom
panying the picture is as follows:
"Qantas celebrates one of the world's oldest cultures
and the latest in aviation technology with 'Yananyi
Dreaming', a painted Boeing 737-800 aircraft.
'Yananyi Dreaming' was created by internationally
renowned Australian design studio Balarinji and
indigenous artist, Rene Kulitja."
W h a t other airline can claim such a combination of the
'celebrated old' and the 'undeniable new'?
The Qantas acknowledgement of a specific artist is a
considerable step forward from the 1966 use of an A b o
riginal design without acknowledging, or gaining the
consent of, the artist. It is also a major step away from
interpreting 'Australia's o w n ' as meaning that anyone is
free to copy or to imitate Aboriginal designs, for items
that range from rugs to umbrellas. That form of appro
priation is made all the worse by its being a massive
departure from the restrictions Aboriginals themselves
observe in relation to the designs and narratives of other
Aboriginals, even within their o w n clan or family.
Is there a place for galleries in relation to these
kinds of border violation? H o w far, and in what ways,
for example, can galleries serve as 'watchdogs' for the
infringement of copyright? O n e positive step taken at
Yiribana is the inclusion of advice on copyright in the
Resource Kit produced by the Education Department
(the advice noted in Section C of this chapter). Another
is proposed by D a w n Casey (former Director of the
National M u s e u m of Australia, and an Aboriginal). Part
of her statement has been quoted before (in Chapter 7),
but I n o w quote it in full. W e live, Casey notes, in an era
when Indigenous people, in m a n y countries, are query
ing and challenging the appropriation of their art:
"(This is) an era in which Aboriginal art decorates
every second T-shirt and a Western dot painting
or Torres Strait shell carving is a must-buy souve
nir for the discriminating tourist. Is this celebra
tion or exploitation? Will the National M u s e u m
of Australia's n e w First Australians Gallery simply
exhibit yet more desirable artefacts to be enjoyed by
visitors w h o fondly imagine that they n o w under
stand Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures,
or will it be a real and challenging dialogue between
cultures in which both are equal partners?"47
In effect, museums might well start by making sure that
their 'in-house' practices are in keeping with concerns
over appropriation, and add to that whatever statements
or displays would increase the general public's awareness
that copyright is an issue and appropriation not the best
way to signal respect and appreciation.
Appropriation, however, is not the only way in which
the demarcation of Aboriginal work m a y be wiped out.
It is also possible to present Aboriginal art without
commen t or without reference to the Aboriginality of
the artist. As Eric Michaels notes:
"(Y)ou can pick up a Y u e n d u m u canvas directly from
a site of production ... and drop it straight into any
contemporary N e w York, Cologne, or Paris gallery ...
without explanation, documentation or apology".48
The work then is up for appreciation purely as a piece of
contemporary art. O n the one hand, this kind of move
seems at odds with the hope that the art will lead into
an understanding of the culture. It can also be regarded
as in line with the wish to have the work appreciated on
the same visual bases that are used in the appreciation
204 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
of other contemporary work: in line, for example, with
Tracey Moffatt's negative response to an invitation to be
included in exhibitions of 'Aboriginal' or 'Black' art. O n
the other hand, if the hope or the intention is that the
work indicates the culture or promotes an understand
ing of the culture, then presenting it without any form of
an Aboriginal reference seems inappropriate.
Again, w e m a y ask about the place of galleries in the
face of these competing possibilities. O n e compromise
step m a y be the Yiribana solution of not tagging each
picture with its 'explanation', but - if needed - grouping
the comments in ways that leave the work appreciated
both as art and as indicative of a culture. Another pos
sible step is to leave the choice with the individual artist.
A third is to argue for more than one form or level of
appreciation being possible. Christine Nicholls argues
for this as a view to adopt toward the work of Dorothy
Napangardi. Her paintings, she agrees, can be regarded
and enjoyed "exclusively as abstract art, cut loose from
their epistomological moorings ... the work is not natu
ralistic ... the .. . lines and dots shimmer and pulsate
in patterns of movement across the canvas. A painting
such as Salt on Mina Mina therefore shares a surface
similarity with some abstract work because of the art
ist's ability to produce an illusion of movement".49
At the same time, Nicholls continues, the evocation
of an illusory sense of movement is not an arbitrary
matter nor an end in itself .. . the sense of movement . . .
acts as a kind of mimesis of the physical movements of
the w o m e n dreaming ancestors as they undertake their
lengthy heroic journey - a journey involving walking,
dancing, singing, and digging ... the sense of movement
in this case mirrors the movement of what is a quite lit
eral journey".50
"Acknowledging the fact that the painting exists in
the context of a Dreaming narrative actually increases
that visual pleasure, by adding layers of meaning to the
work".51 Those layers of meaning are important to A b o
riginal viewers, Nicholls points out. They see people
"running through and across the country .. . crossing .. .
one another's pathways, as they go travelling".52 All told,
Nicholls recommends, w e should consistently ask about
perceptions of the work by other Aboriginals and accept
that the work "can be appreciated at multiple levels".53
Allowing for that multiplicity would seem a better alter
native than the insistence that the narrative background
be completely ignored or that no Aboriginal painting
can be properly appreciated without a text that spells
out its semantics.
Moves and influence in the direction of a divide. W h a t
promotes treating Aboriginal art as a distinctive body of
work; one to be named as 'Aboriginal'? T w o influences
are apparent here: the interests of international visitors
and the preferences of some Aboriginal artists.
The expectations of international visitors matter to
m u s e u m s . M a n y of the Gallery's visitors from overseas
have seen Aboriginal art exhibited or discussed in their
o w n cities: London, Paris, M o s c o w , N e w York, Chicago,
Venice. It has the appeal of being distinctively different,
of containing the kind of exotic 'otherness' that people
travel to see. They wish to see Aboriginal art for some of
the same reasons that they travel to the centre of Aus
tralia to see the landmark monolithic rock, Uluru.
It is not surprising then that the Director of the Art
Gallery of N S W (Edward Capon), in his comments for
the 1994 opening of the Yiribana Gallery and the accom
panying book, refers to there being several goals for this
"major survey publication of our collection":
"It is intended to meet the needs of a growing number
of our overseas visitors to this Gallery as well as
our Australian audiences w h o seek a greater under
standing and appreciation of the art of the original
Australians. It makes a valuable contribution to the
way w e look at Australian art today and provides
insight into the distinctive values and traditions of
Aboriginal cultural traditions".54
Casey, D . (2001) "The National Museum of Australia: Exploring the Past, Illuminating the
Present and Imagining the Future", p.8. In Mclntyre, D . and Wehner, K . (Eds.) (2001) Na
tional Museums: Negotiating Histories. Canberra: National Museum of Australia.
Michaels, E. (1989) "Postmodernism, Appropriation and Western Desert Acrylics". In Kra
mer, S. (Ed.] Postmodernism: A Consideration of Appropriation of Aboriginal Imagery - Fo
rum Papers. Brisbane: Institute of Modern Art, p.28.
Nicholls, C . (2003) "Grounded Abstraction", p,65. In the Catalogue for the Exhibition: Danc
ing Up Country - Works by Dorothy Napangardi. Sydney: Museum of Contemporary Art.
ibid., p.66.
ibid., p.65.
ibid., p.67.
ibid., p.67.
In Neale, M . ( 1994) Op.cit, p.4.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 205
This respect for visitors' insistence on 'difference', h o w
ever, is not without risk. A n emphasis on what is 'dis
tinctively different', for example - conveniently packaged
in one place - works against the merger of Aboriginal
art into any general section of Australian art or con
temporary art. M u s e u m s m a y also come to perpetuate
visitors' categories rather than work toward stretching
visitors' distinctions and expectations. Visitors' attach
ment to what they n o w recognise as 'Aboriginal art' m a y
soon become uncomfortably at odds with the changing
forms that Aboriginal art continually takes. Just as the
public 'catches up' with one form, Aboriginal art invents
another.
It remains to be seen, for example, whether visitors
w h o have come to feel that they k n o w what 'Aboriginal
art' is like will take readily to the more explicitly politi
cal work of some of the 'new' Indigenous artists. They
m a y also not take readily to work that clearly shows the
marks of formal training, leaving the viewer without
the sense of pleasurable surprise that 'Aboriginal art' art
appears 'out of nowhere' and is produced by people with
no conventionally recognised skills or advantages.
M u s e u m s m a y not need do all the work needed to
m o v e viewers away from their categories. The way most
open m a y be that represented by the 1991 artwork by Lin
O n u s mentioned earlier: Fruit Bats. White Australian
suburbia is marked by the widespread prevalence of an
umbrella-shaped form of clothesline k n o w n as a Hill's
Hoist: an Australian invention and a widely recognised
symbol of white Australian domesticity and presence.
O n to a standard Hill's Hoist, Onus has hung sculpted
fruit bats in upside-down sleeping position (they seem
to be about 100 in number). Fruit bats are also famil
iar to White Australians, regarded with a recognition of
their uniqueness and with mixed feelings of affection,
amusement, and annoyance. These fruit bats, h o w
ever, are etched with the hatched lines and the colours
that mark m a n y bark paintings. They are immediately
recognisable as Aboriginal. (The hatching and colour
ing are not part of Onus ' immediate tradition and she
had to secure permission to use them). The juxtaposi
tion announces an Aboriginal presence in everyday life
rather than in some remote and easily distanced part of
the country. It m a y be read in a variety of ways - from
a wry joke to a statement of uneasy co-existence, or a
threat. At the least, it is addressed to the links between
two ways of living rather than only to the distance
between them. It is also not 'a dot painting'. It is as
well extremely popular and often reproduced in photo
graphed form. W o r k such as this then m a y present a way
forward that is provided by Aboriginal artists them
selves inventing new forms that are recognisably A b o
riginal, not 'traditional', distinctive in their o w n right,
and border-bending rather than making a forced choice
between staying firmly on one side or other of a divide.
Moving Forward
Chapter 8 completes the third pair of chapters that focus
on a particular type of m u s e u m . That type was the one
k n o w n as art galleries, rounding out the previous pairs:
natural history museums (with 'cultural' sections), and
historic sites. That range, like the choice of two countries,
was chosen as a way of providing a bank of examples
that would bring out a variety of forms of challenge and
change, with enough similarity a m o n g m u s e u m s to allow
some replication of patterns but also enough difference
to avoid simply repeating events as w e moved from one
m u s e u m to another.
W h a t other m u s e u m s might n o w add effectively to
the picture?
206 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
CHAPTER 9
Future Steps
TW O G E N E R A L A I M S have prompted this en
terprise. O n e is the aim of working toward an
understanding of challenge and transformation: an
understanding that is both general and also relevant to
museums. The other is the aim of developing a kind
of source book that any m u s e u m might use as it faces
various forms of challenge and moments of change. N o
m u s e u m situation is likely to be unique. Others are likely
to have faced similar circumstances, and the actions they
tried or considered can provide a set of possibilities for
other museums to consider or avoid.
To take those aims further, what next steps n o w seem
best? I have broken the possibilities into two sets. The
first set revolves around decisions about action. A n y
decision, it is suggested, benefits from taking a close
look at the nature and impact of various stakeholders,
breaking 'contest' or 'challenge' into its specific forms,
linking those particular forms to particular actions, and
looking to other media to see what challenges might be
expected and what actions might be borrowed or best
avoided.
The second set revolves around the questions: W h a t
other sites might n o w be chosen in order to add to what
has been learned so far? O n e might turn, for example,
to other museums within South Africa or Australia or
to m u s e u m s in other countries. The proposal offered is
that the places to turn to are those that illustrate or are
facing particular m o m e n t s and forms of challenge and
change. These m a y be m u s e u m s that celebrate revolu
tionary change, that grapple with some particular links
and oppositions between self and others, or that face
difficulties in maintaining the changes they have m a d e .
S o m e examples of possible choices, and their bases, are
outlined.
A. Making Challenge And Change
Specific
'Protest', 'challenge', 'contest', 'change', ' n e w relationships':
these are broad terms. W h a t specific forms do they take?
That delineation is essential to any analysis of challenge
or change and any decision about action. I begin by pro
posing that in any analysis, or any decision, one must
consider the nature and impact of various stakeholders.
The Nature and Impact of Various
Stakeholders
The several chapters have brought out the presence of a
variety of stakeholders in w h a t m u s e u m s collect and display,
and in the w a y decisions are m a d e . These stakeholders
m a y range from funding and regulatory bodies to advisory
boards, Friends of the M u s e u m , m u s e u m staff, experts
in various disciplines, visitors to the m u s e u m , tour
operators, and communi ty groups concerned about the
nature of their representation. At times, people m a y
belong to only one stakeholder group. O n occasions, they
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 207
m a y be involved in more than one. They m a y be, for exam
ple, both a m e m b e r of a concerned community group
and a m e m b e r of the m u s e u m staff or of a museum's
advisory board or managing Trust.
W h y do stakeholders matter? In brief, they mat
ter because each brings both an agenda and a set of
resources: resources that can facilitate some actions
and constrain others. They matter also because m u c h of
'what m u s e u m s should be like' is written in terms that
allow a fair degree of discretion when it comes to their
implementation into practice. Terms such as 'building a
nation', 'presenting a history', 'reconciliation', 'partner
ship', or 'consultation', for example, can be interpreted
in m a n y ways. In effect, there is room for various agen
das to come into play, arguing for some interpretations
rather than others.
W h a t then needs to be known? For each of the several
stakeholders, it is important to k n o w h o w they interpret
these several terms, what they perceive as the functions
of a particular m u s e u m , h o w they would perceive any
particular change, and what resources they can bring to
advocating one position or interpretation rather than
another.
In more general terms, one m a y well ask about the
extent to which there exist shared meanings among the
several stakeholders. These shared meanings m a y apply
to over-arching ideas about the functions of a m u s e u m
or to more specific views about what is meant by terms
such as 'consultation' or 'ownership'.
Important to consider are also the areas where peo
ple feel that a difference in views is a major rather than
a minor issue, and what each group sees as acceptable
ways of pushing one's case or of resolving a difference
that is felt to matter. To take one example of significant
areas of difference from the earlier chapters, a differ
ence in views about the display of secret/sacred mate
rial is a major issue for Aboriginal Australians. To take
an example of differences in 'acceptable ways to resolve',
one m a y turn to the discussion about the exhibition
Miscast in Chapter 7. There the offer to make objections
part of the material displayed, making them highly vis
ible but part of the exhibition, was felt by at least one
critic to be adding insult to injury, to be one more form
of treating people only as 'objects of study'.
Delineating Areas of Challenge
I take as an example of moving toward specificity the
several forms of challenge that Indigenous people in
various regions m a y present. The list is an amalgama
tion from several regions, allowing one to ask which are
emphasised by particular groups or in what order chal
lenges emerge. The final two in the list below, for exam
ple, (don't make us exactly like you, don't re-essentialise)
occur at a point after changes in response to the earlier
challenges begin to appear.
This list has been referred to in Chapters 3 and 4. To
recap, however, they cover:
(1) W e are not dead, extinct, or relevant only to the
past; (2) Our relevance is not only to remote or rural
areas; (3) W e were not lacking in creativity, complexity
of thought or complexity in action; (4) W e are not to
be considered dehumanised objects of study; (5) Return
what belongs to us: the bodies of our people, our reli
gious symbols; (6) The n e w narratives should be our
stories, not simply yours (your discoveries etc.); (7) The
n e w narratives should acknowledge diversity a m o n g
us but not use your categories; (8) The n e w narratives
should acknowledge past injustices but avoid new essen-
tialising and n e w simplicities.
Specification can also apply to general calls for 'con
sultation' or 'partnership'. W e m a y ask, for example,
whether the concern is with methods of collection,
display or decision-making, what particular forms
of 'consultation' or 'partnership' people see as accept
able, meaningless, or objectionable, and where the core
sensitivities for any particular group lie. It is attrac
tively easy, for example, to assume that all people will
be interested in the return from m u s e u m s of bod
ies or body parts: 'repatriation' can easily be seen as
the same kind of concern in all Indigenous groups. It
is then salutary to learn that Native American groups
vary in their interest, with some pressing for return
but at least one - the Zuni are the example cited - being
reluctant to accept the return of bodies until they
have developed purification ceremonies to undo
the contamination stemming from the means of their
collection and their stay in m u s e u m s settings.
208 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*- MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
Delineating Specific Steps in Change
Breaking 'contest' d o w n into specific parties and specific
challenges is a first m o v e toward asking what responses
have been made , might be made , or - if not m a d e - help
account for continuing dissatisfaction. Changes need
to be broken d o w n in ways linked to the specifics of
challenge.
That point has come up in several chapters. As a
s u m m a r y example, consider the demand often phrased
as 'attract n e w audiences'. That demand is difficult to
meet unless one asks: Which n e w audiences? W h o spe
cifically does not come? Might come? Might come more
than once and be willing to pay admission, at least for
special exhibitions? W h a t currently holds them back
from coming? Is it perhaps transport, cost, or an off-
putting perception of the m u s e u m and its offerings?
The Australian M u s e u m provides one instance of
targeting (Chapter 4). It was popular with schools and
with parents w h o brought their children to see dinosaur
bones and stuffed replicas of 'old' animals. Body Art
was one m o v e to bring in the young-adult group. The
exhibition on Death (illustrating the ways in which
people over time and from various parts of the world
perceive and handle death) is a first attempt to target
the 'over-6o's'. This is a group that has leisure time and
that Australian art galleries attract as both mid-week
and weekend audiences. With the results of a survey
pointing to this group's perception of the m u s e u m
as 'child-oriented and dull', the m u s e u m n o w has the
specific task of undoing those perceptions. As Patricia
Davison observed in relation to the 'new audience' chal
lenge for the Castle in Cape T o w n , no one exhibition is
likely to attract all the possible audiences. Each tempo
rary exhibition, however, m a y bring in n e w groups and
begin to m a k e museum-going part of that group's cul
ture.
Making Comparisons:
Looking to Other Media
Looking at two countries and at several museums in each
offers one way of making comparisons. Less expected,
perhaps, is the argument that other media also are worth
noting.
W h y bother considering these? They do offer other
ways of telling narratives, and other arenas where con
test and change are prominent: prints, film, television,
radio, dance, song.
W h a t can they offer specifically, however, to peo
ple analysing or coping with contest and change in the
world of museums?
Three reasons for taking note of other media stand
out:
• These often represent the competition. They are often
the preferred sources for learning about 'the facts',
and for entertainment. W h a t then can m u s e u m s offer
that is 'better' or attractively 'different'?
• They influence the information and the attitudes
that audiences bring to what they see. Cape Town's
m u s e u m s offer two examples. Local people often k n e w
that the people in a set of three portraits in the Gallery
were "portraits of the secret police w h o interrogated
Steve Biko",1 even though the title had been changed
from The Interrogators to Tryptych. Local people,
after the hearings of the Truth and Reconciliation
Commission, in other media, were not eager to learn
more from m u s e u m s about h u m a n rights abuses.
They were, to use Patricia Davison's term, relatively
"surfeited" and were eager to "move forward".
• They can be a source for both concepts and strategies.
That source m a y be relevant to groups offering a chal
lenge. Aboriginals turningtheir eyes toward Australian
m u s e u m s , for example, would have been well aware of
changes taking place in film and television production.
In these media, the meanings of'access', 'consultation',
and 'participation' had already been found in practice,
and Aboriginal meanings had been asserted (Chapter
4). M u s e u m groups, at the least, need to be aware
of what has already c o m e to be claimed or accepted
practice in other media.
Other media can also be a useful source for m u s e u m s
facing questions about what to do, what to avoid, and
h o w to frame or think about contest and change. The
South African slogan "the rainbow nation" was m a d e
concrete, for example, at the opening of the 2003 World
Cricket series, with blacks, whites and 'Malay' dressed in
each other's traditional costumes. The opening of that
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "*< MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 209
series was similar to the opening of the Olympic G a m e s
in Sydney in 2000, with the ceremony in both cases
aimed at a combination of nation-building and some
global advertising as a country that is multicultural,
'inclusive', and aware of its mixed past.
B. Choosing Other Sites:
O n What Bases?
M u s e u m s in Cape T o w n and Sydney have provided the
main material used for extending our understanding of
contest and change and their implications. To add to
our understanding and to a 'source-book' for possible
actions, what other sites might be fruitful? There is little
to be gained by simply adding m u s e u m s that are conven
iently at hand. The need instead is to choose on the basis
that these particular places illuminate some particular
forms of tension, contest or change, or some particular
solutions.
O n that kind of basis, for example, one might well
turn to m u s e u m s that specifically celebrate large
moment s of political change: m u s e u m s celebrating
revolutions in countries such as - alphabetically - Cuba
or Mexico. O n e might add as well a further dimension.
There would be m u c h to learn from m u s e u m s in coun
tries where the connections between 'self and 'other'
- between the more and the less privileged, between 'set
tler' and 'Indigene', for example - take some especially
challenging forms. Bolivia stands out as a particular
instance of such complexity, with concepts and repre
sentations of the 'Indian' showing an uncomfortable
double picture:
"The 'Indian' was conceived mainly in negative terms
in relation to Creole culture. Tndian-ness', accord
ing to innumerable essays, novels, films and speeches
about the national character, simply was all that is
outside 'civilisation': it was primitive, passive, fatalis
tic, enigmatic and timeless. At the same time, Tndian-
ness' was also established in its historic specificity,
exhibited with pre-Colombian greatness and pic
tured in an Edenic past".2
M u s e u m s then have to find ways of coping with the Indi
an's double status. Cordova sees them as doing so in ways
still open to challenge:
" M u s e u m s , education programs and cultural mani
festations play a fundamental role in this process of
faked integration. They collect, disseminate, describe,
represent or transform objects and sites considered of
historical importance due to their relationship to the
nation's past greatness, but they m a k e no connection
whatsoever of those glorious ancestors with present-
day Indians".3
Cordova sees museums as also supported in a "faked
integration" by other media:
"Although Bolivian Indigenous artists represented
a healthy alternative to the open racism of Bolivian
elite, they weren't able to overcome a romantic per
spective that posed in Indigenous cultures an aura
of authenticity and purity and interpreted any sub
sequent change or adaptation as loss of culture or
'alienation'. As a result of this tendency, Bolivian writ
ers, painters and filmmakers idealized and essential-
ized the Indian cultures, mythicized them in a his
torical vacuum, but did nothing to grant them real
political participation".4
This "folklorisation" of indigenous cultures, Cordova
continues, currently sits uneasily at odds with the reality
of Indian life. Its rural emphasis, for example, sits uneas
ily side by side with the large-scale movement of Indians
into the cities. Its emphasis on achieving a single national
identity by turning Indians into "rhetorical ... Bolivian
citizens" also has little to do with the Indians' capacity to
bypass acculturation strategies but at the same time to
appropriate "modern mass imaginaries".5
In short, here is a country where the challenges
offered, and the changes m a d e or considered, m a y well
be expected to take forms other than those seen within
the Cape T o w n and Sydney m u s e u m s I have considered.
For a last example of choice and its basis in terms of
particular challenges or particular forms and moments
of change, I stay within Australia but m o v e outside Syd
ney to the capital city, Canberra. The m u s e u m used
210 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <»• MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
as an example is the relatively n e w (opened in 2001)
National M u s e u m of Australia.6
Illustrating A Moment of Change:
The National Museum of Australia
This is the m u s e u m mentioned in Chapter 2 as having
attracted criticism from the start as 'biased' in its view of
Australian history and as facing review - two years after
its opening - by a group that seems likely to be intent on
'correcting' the narratives presented.
W h a t stands out for this m u s e u m ? O n e feature is
the background and probable position of some par
ticular stakeholders: the members of the review group.
A critical s u m m a r y of the four-person team notes that
it includes one senior curator, a palaeontologist, and a
major real estate figure, and that the chairperson has "a
strong interest in questions of Australian identity and
the need for grand narratives".7
A second feature is the extent to which the central
issues are likely to be seen as 'ideological bias' and the
'proper ways' of developing a 'true' account of history.
There is no question about the inclusion of Aboriginals
within the museum' s presentation of Australian history.
Its charter, even its critics agree, "specifically mandates
that the m u s e u m shall contain 'a gallery of Aboriginal
Australia'".8
The manner of its doing so is the rub. The chair of
the National M u s e u m of Australia's M u s e u m C o u n
cil, for example, describes himself as "agnostic" on the
question of whether the m u s e u m is biased in its balance
of white versus black history. H e also adds the caveat
that the museum' s exhibitions must be an "authorita
tive and objective" account of history.9
A s u m m a r y of the two views with regard to the
review brings out the extent to which the underlying
issues cover both content and method. Both views were
expressed in public newspaper articles rather than in
more private academic chapters: one indication that
what happens in m u s e u m s is perceived as relevant out
side them.
I start with an article that was critical of the review
and then summarise a response that praised its estab
lishment.
The critical position was expressed by Joyce Morgan.
She describes the review as:
"a politically-driven attempt to rein in the muse
u m ' s portrayal of history and open a n e w front in
the Howard Government's ideological culture wars.
A battle-royal between the black-armband view of
Australian history, so disapproved of by the Prime
Minister - w h o sees it as a belief that most Australian
history since 1788 has been little more than a dis
graceful story of imperialism, exploitation, racism,
sexism and other forms of discrimination - and the
celebratory three cheers view".10
Morgan also doubts that the review will be impartial. Its
public brief is broad and open to several interpretations
("look at the museum's performance, including its con
tent, exhibitions and public programs against its act and
charter"). The committee members are likely to bring
with them preferences both for a 'three cheers' view of
history and methods that belong to the 'grand narrative',
'single-voice' kind.
A n article by Glenn Milne (chief political corre
spondent for the Seven Network and columnist at the
more conservative, Canberra-based The Australian)
notes first that the battle is indeed about content and
then moves strongly to the argument that at issue are
the methods used to establish historical accounts.
Bedford, E. (1996) ''Curator's Preface". At http://museums.org.za/sang/SA/art/art_intr.htm.
^ Denver, S. ( 1994) "Las de Abajo: La Revolucion Mexicana de Matilde Landeta". In: Archivos de
la Filmoteca. Revista de Estudios Historicos de la Imagen de la Filmoteca de la Generalitat
Valencia. No . 16 (Febuary 1994). p. 47, cited by Cordova, V (2002) Cinema and Revolution
in Latin America: A Cinematic Reading of History. A Historical Reading of Film. Bergen: Dept.
of Media Studies, p.98.
3 Cordova (2002) Op.cit, p.98.
4lbid,p.l06.
5ibid,pp.l36-137.
This is not the only possible choice. For another specific "case", for example - one illuminating
a particular form of change, one might turn to a museum faced with the unavailability of
funds for a new building and a governmental demand to increase "access" and "community
participation". In essence, the move in this case was toward "a museum without walls". See
Kusel, U . (2001 ) "Negotiating N e w Histories in a N e w South Africa". In Mclntyre, D . and
Wehner, K . (Eds.) (2001 ) National Museums: Negotiating Histories. Conference Proceedings.
National Museum of Australia: Canberra. 7
Morgan, I. (2003) In The Sydney Morning Herald, Ian.4-5, p. 18. The chairperson - TonyStaley
- is a former Minister under an earlier conservative Prime Minister (Fraser) and President
of the country's Liberal Party.
8 Milne, G . (2002) In The Australian, Dec. 30, p.ll.
9 Cited by Milne, G . (2002) ibid.
1 0 Morgan, J. (2003) Op.cit., p. 13.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 211
O n content, and on context, he is in agreement with
Morgan :
"Influential figures close to the Howard Government
believe that in the context of the Windshuttle debate
the four-person review should be charged with set
tling the central question that has hovered over the
m u s e u m since its opening two years ago: D o the
exhibits overall present a view of Australian history
that implicitly assumes the deliberate destruction
of the Aboriginal race, at the expense of celebrating
white achievements in the time since European set
tlement?"11
O n method, Milne promptly moves toward an attack on
the methods used to establish the kind of history that the
m u s e u m presents. H e sees the m u s e u m , and its support
ing historians, as tainted by an uncritical acceptance of
views such as those presented by Derrida:
"Derrida's theory rests on the claim that the British
empirical method of establishing facts and recording
them is inadequate because such history is polluted
by existing class values. Therefore, says Derrida, his
tory should be revitalised using contemporary values.
Within Derrida's world view, 'facts' in the old sense
cease to exist".12
The "Derrida" approach is also singled out in earlier
criticism of the m u s e u m , offered at the time of the first
exhibitions by the historian Windshuttle, author of the
controversial 2002 book titled The Fabrication of Aborigi
nal History. Milne cites two of Windshuttle's arguments:
"If you abandon the principles of empirical history -
that evidence is independent of the observer and that
truth is discovered rather than invented - you consign
everyone to their o w n cultural cocoons, from which
all they can do is talk past one another. N o debate
can ever be resolved."
" A public institution like the National M u s e u m
does not have the right to pander to theoretical fash
ions this way. A s it stands n o w , the m u s e u m ' s fron
tier conflict display is dominated by such thinking
with the prominence it gives to the Bells Falls Gorge
Massacre - a completely mythical event - and the
romantic treatment it gives to Jandamurra, w h o has
as m u c h claim to be a patriotic freedom fighter as
Henry Reynold's mythical guerrilla warriors of V a n
Dieman's Land".13
Not cited in this article, but clearly in line with Milne's
position, is a 2001 c o m m e n t on the m u s e u m by
Windshuttle, regarding it as:
"a repository of nothing more than the intellectual
poverty of the tertiary-educated middle class of the
post-Vietnam W a r era".14
The National M u s e u m of Australia Director's view of
what was likely to happen is understandably cautious. In
her view, all m u s e u m s should be open to scrutiny. Her
concern is that such reviews m a y easily turn into an ide
ological battle:
"I hope it doesn't happen ... but it's inevitable - given
the act under which w e were established, where we're
required to cover people and their relationship with
the environment, Australian society since 1788 and
the history and culture of Aboriginal and Torres
Strait islander people - that we'll be drawn into some
of the issues that are being debated today".15
In short, here is a m u s e u m where the main source of
contest and change is not an Indigenous community
arguing for a place in history and for the acknowledge
ment of both past achievements and injustices. Instead,
the main challenge comes from a group of non-Indig
enous questioning whether 'the balance' has n o w been
tipped too far and needs correcting. Here also is an open
recognition that m u s e u m s are politically important and
the battle is political.
" W h a t this debate represents is a battle for the hearts
and minds of middle Australia. The way they view
their history will affect the w a y they vote. W h a t has
n o w been joined at the N M A is a fight for ownership
of the past in the sure knowledge that whichever side
of politics owns the past will also o w n the future".16
212 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION ^ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
The end result was that the first Director of the National
M u s e u m of Australia, D a w n Casey, an Aboriginal w o m a n ,
did not have her contract renewed and left the museum.
This last m u s e u m points to the final method I wish to
note for the analysis of challenge and change. Moments
of transition have been proposed as offering particular
opportunities for that analysis. So also does the moni
toring of events after some particular moments .
In South Africa, for example, 1994 was a watershed
m o m e n t of change: a shift in the governing party and
the emergence of an explicit intention to transform
museums in ways that promoted nation-building: cor
recting old images, making displays and audiences
more inclusive, contributing to the economic growth of
the country, functioning together rather than autono
mously and new forms of administration and funding.
Those changes were massive.
At the "window of time" chosen for the present anal
ysis, marked changes had clearly begun. The size of the
changes, however, had slowed the pace. Here then is a
particular need, and a particular opportunity, to moni
tor by way of a second look. In the epilogue that follows,
the current C E O of Iziko (Jatti Bredekamp) takes the
Cape T o w n narrative that further step along the path of
change.
Milne, G . (2002) Op.cit. 1 2 ibid. 13ibtd. 1 4 Cited by Morgan, J. (2003) Op.cit. 1 5 ibid. 1 6 Milne, G . (2002) Op.cit.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 213
Epilogue
Jatti Bredekamp
SI G N I F I C A N T STRIDES T O W A R D S change,
prompted by challenges noted by the author of this
report about three years ago, have since been made
at some of the Iziko m u s e u m sites featuring so promi
nently in this publication. It is those changes that war
rant a postscript to this publication of a study conducted
in Cape T o w n in 2001/2002.
Iziko S A M u s e u m As A Site of
Natural/Cultural History
Chapter 3 presents the South African M u s e u m of 2001
correctly as a m u s e u m with a strong emphasis on natural
history mixed with some static ethnographic representa
tion of the first indigenous people of the subcontinent.
Except for the innovative transformation project of black
trainee fossil preparators to be seen skillfully at work in
the exhibition area since late 2003 and the informative
SharkWorld exhibition opened in late 2004, the Natural
History Division has not yet m a d e a considerable contri
bution to transformation in the sphere of public inter
face at Iziko S A M u s e u m .
However the Social History Division, which has
assertively taken charge of the ethnographic collec
tions of over a century and a half in the S A M u s e u m ,
has significantly changed some of its public interface
spaces over the past three years. O f particular relevance
in this regard is h o w the Division in collaboration with
the Property Services Division has lived up to the chal
lenge of innovatively and creatively changing the dated
rock art exhibits on the ground floor. Within the first
quarter of the new C E O ' s tenure, he facilitated the for
mation of an Iziko Rock Art Exhibition Project Refer
ence Group with Carol Kaufmann as project manager.
At its second meeting in March 2003 the selection of
a designer for the exhibition was somewhat delayed
because of a strong feeling among some of the invited
indigenous peoples organizations that the consultation
process should 'involve first giving information about
the proposal (to the organizations), and then addressing
issues around the themes and choice of objects for dis
play'. Nonetheless, after m u c h sweat and toil of curators
and their support staff, Iziko could showcase, in early
December 2003, the first phase of its transformatory
exhibition project IQe - The Power of Rock Art: Ances
tors, Rainmaking and Healing.
This achievement was the outcome of trust, goodwill
and cooperation between Iziko staff, government func
tionaries, and representatives of both the indigenous
world and the academia. The very delicate and arduous
task of moving from the old S A M archaeology display
area some of the treasured art wonders of the world on
rock slabs, weighing up to 800 kg, was done by commit
ted m u s e u m staff in collaboration with a recommended
geo-technical consultant of the South African Heritage
Resources Agency ( S A H R A ) , over the last weekend of
August 2003. Then the contractors of the D P W moved
214 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION °~ MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
in to alter completely the structural appearance of S A M
areas needed for the first phase of the exhibition project.
By 1 October they handed over the transformed space
to Iziko and the designers moved in to have the n e w
exhibition ready for the launch on 6 December 2003.
The new exhibition highlights an outstanding selec
tion from the Iziko rock art collection, which includes
three very large and fragile rock faces (the Linton and
Zaamenkomst panels), as well as smaller examples of
both rock paintings and engravings. The installation of
these works subscribes to the highest aesthetic stand
ards and innovation attracting m a n y visitors though
not yet as a world-class destination.
In its conceptualization the exhibition, representing
a vast time scale spanning 80 000 years, is largely based
on the ideas of Jeanette Deacon, Iziko's leading special
ist consultant on rock art. It is a re-imagination of what
was on display before and showcasing the vision of the
Iziko group of national m u s e u m s as a heritage institu
tion promoting African knowledge. More specifically,
the exhibition presents 'rock art as an authentic record
of the close interaction between the culture and belief
systems of the artists and their knowledge of the natural
world.' It conveys a message seeking appreciation from
viewers of the visual splendour and cultural value of
the paintings and engravings. Already in its first phase
good use is made of audiovisual material like film clips
illustrating trance experience and healing rituals, which
are central to an understanding of the art.
Another great attraction in the exhibition is the
Blombos ochre in its custom-designed case sponsored
by the Anglo American Corporation. In early 2005 the
mining house D e Beers made a grant of RIV4, million
available to Iziko for implementation of the next phase
of the project.
Conclusion of the multi-phased rock art exhibi
tion project by 2007 will in all probability coincide and
bring closure to the consultation process around the
future of the controversial archived Karoo "Bushmen"
diorama. Whatever the outcome of that process and the
imagined relationship between the diorama images and
the re-imagined / Q e rock art gallery, provision will be
made for an innovative visual account of the archived
diorama as part of Iziko's pre-democratic history of
representation.
The / Q e exhibition project was, however, not the only
Iziko initiative that granted Khoi-San voices space to be
heard loud and clearly. Iziko also listened to them in its
transformation of the curatorship of h u m a n remains in
its collections. In a way this process started towards the
end of the previous C E O ' s tenure when Iziko's manage
ment team and Council recognized the need for strict
guidelines pertaining to the management of h u m a n
remains in their collections. But no significant progress
was made in the development of a policy after his depar
ture or at the beginning of his successor's term of office.
At the beginning of his tenure the latter tried in vain to
initiate, in partnership with S A H R A ' s archaeology unit,
a strategy to develop a national policy on the manage
ment of h u m a n remains collections. Iziko then had to
embark on its o w n process of developing such a policy
with the support of other stakeholders and S A H R A .
The process benefited from a 'transformation' grant of
the national Department of Arts and Culture in 2003.
The same year it started and completed an audit of
the h u m a n remains accessioned into Iziko collections,
which was done by a contracted physical anthropologist
of Khoi-San descent working on his doctorate. Dino
Steiner's final report contained not only a summary of
his findings but also recommendations for steps to be
taken by Iziko concerning unethically collected h u m a n
remains in the Iziko Physical Anthropology collection
which date to between 1900 and 1930.
Following the completion of the collection audit, a
Khoekhoe intellectual and activist, Dr Yvette Abrahams,
was appointed on contract as community liaison officer
in early 2004. She was tasked with initiating contact
with leaders of affected South African communities and
providing them with details about the h u m a n remains
in Iziko collections. After completing her field consul
tations, she organized a workshop at Iziko to initiate
group discussions with representatives from c o m m u n i
ties with a view to agreeing on the consultation proc
ess for the future custodianship of the h u m a n remains.
Related communities in the Northern and Western
Cape were identified based on geographical location
and proximity of descendant communities to the places
where skeletons had been collected. Consultation work
shops were held in the Northern and Western Cape in
the last quarter of 2004. A n d in late November 2004 a
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <*- MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 215
general workshop for community representatives and
other stakeholders, including scientists and m u s e u m
curators, was held at Iziko M u s e u m s of Cape T o w n .
Discussions at the November workshop focused on
aspects of an interim policy, on the future of the h u m a n
remains in m u s e u m collections and on the process for
applications for the return of h u m a n remains for burial.
Representatives from some communities declared their
intention to apply to Iziko for the restitution and re-
burial of h u m a n remains from their areas.
While the above phases of the project made good
progress, the C E O succeeded also in gaining the sup
port of some of the most critical voices against the stor
ing of skeletal remains in the old S A M u s e u m to serve
on a Reference Group for the development of such a
policy. A m o n g them were m e n and w o m e n of note like
the co-author of Skeletons in the Cupboard, Professor
Martin Legassick, the project leader of the University of
the Western Cape's project Sarah Baartman, Dr Yvette
Abrahams, the h u m a n rights lawyer and legal represent
ative of the San Council of South Africa, Roger Chen-
nels, and the Chairperson of the National Khoi-San
Consultative Conference, H e a d m a n Cecil le Fleur. Their
drafts were discussed with a range of community repre
sentatives (as indicated above), academics and a repre
sentative from S A H R A between September and N o v e m
ber 2004. The final draft policy document has also been
made available in English, Afrikaans and N a m a . W h e n
ratified, in mid-2005, this policy will guide the curato
rial practice of Iziko M u s e u m s until a national policy
on the curatorship of h u m a n remains has been devel
oped.
Groot Constantia, Bo-Kaap, Slave
Lodge and Castle of Good Hope
as Iziko Historical Sites and/or
House Museums
Over the past three years Iziko responded with relative
success to the challenge posed in Chapter 5 in respect of
the undoing of the colonial narratives presented in its
four historical sites mentioned. At Groot Constantia the
undoing gained m o m e n t u m after the new C E O insisted
with the support of Iziko's government appointed Coun
cil that he be appointed ex officio as Iziko's representa
tive on the Groot Constantia Trust C o m p a n y governed
by an Act of Parliament passed hastily in 1993 before the
end of the Apartheid regime. In October 2003 the Trust
had no option but to appoint him as one of their direc
tors, replacing one of his white senior managers at Iziko.
Within less than a year after his appointment to the
Board, the C E O could inform his fellow Board members
that Iziko had applied successfully to the D A C transfor
mation budget to fund its transformation exhibition
project on the history of slavery at Groot Constantia.
About six months later, in October 2004, m a n y were
astonished at the alternative narrative presented on
fixed display panels at the orientation center of Groot
Constantia's historical core, focusing on the roles of
slaves in the history of the estate from 1685 to 1838.
They were equally surprised to see on the display pan
els the names of slaves recorded in the 1778 transfer of
the estate as the names represented well-known family
names associated with that of the broader coloured c o m
munity in South Africa. Furthermore, the n e w exhi
bition makes visitors to Groot Constantia aware of
slaves as not only unfree labourers of an earlier era,
but also as holders of occupations practiced by them
- such as skilled 'vintagers', coopers, masons, carpenters,
wagoners, shoemakers and domestics. Alternative as it
is, the history of the slave owners of the estate like Gov
ernor Simon van der Stel and Hendrik Cloete have also
their space on the display panels.
Meanwhile a more ambitious project for the historical
core of Groot Constantia is currently being conceptual
ized. At the beginning of 2005 Iziko embarked on the
challenge to present in partnership with government and
business alternative narratives to the colonial narratives
of the estate in respect of conceptualizing and designing
an interactive and edutaining Gateway Museum to the
South African Winelands. Without losing its histor
ical character and ambience as heritage site in concept
and design, the m u s e u m will incorporate all spaces and
structures of Groot Constantia's historical core.
O n e historical m u s e u m site mentioned in Chapter 5
as an Iziko managed m u s e u m which has not undergone
any noteworthy change over the past three years, is the
Bo-Kaap m u s e u m . A significant dilemma in this regard
2l6 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "•» MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
for Iziko as national heritage institution is the Bo-Kaap
Museum's contested past and divisions within the faith
based community about its ownership alluded to
in this publication. Nonetheless, steady progress has been
made in gaining support from some which is ena
bling Iziko's Social History Division to start a develop
mental programme that will change the Bo-Kaap
m u s e u m within three years into a social history m u s e u m
that focuses on both the local history of the Bo-Kaap
and the social history of Islam at the Cape.
While this initiative is under way, the Iziko Bo-Kaap
m u s e u m is providing safe neutral space for community
interest groups where culture related issues could be
raised without fear of intimidation. In this way they are
also encouraged to become involved in the program of
transformation of the Bo-Kaap m u s e u m . This approach
resulted in a display in 2004 of the life and work of the
late poet, philantropist and political activist Tatamkulu
Afrika, which was installed in collaboration with his
literary friends and the al Jihaad. At the beginning of
March 2005 the wife of the Premier of the Western Cape,
Roshieda Shabodien, opened a well-attended workshop
at the Bo-Kaap m u s e u m on Transformation in Represen
tations of Muslim Women of the Cape.
None of the fifteen Iziko m u s e u m sites have changed
as dramatically between 2002 and 2005 as the Slave
Lodge at ground level. A capital work schedule of the
Department of Public Works ( D P W ) to improve only
the outside appearance of the neglected building next
to Parliament was challenged successfully by the C E O
in the course of 2003. H e argued that transformation
of the space inside the Slave Lodge was critically more
important than giving the old South African Cultural
History M u s e u m ( S A C H M ) only a facelift next to our
new Parliament. While negotiating with D P W func
tionaries, an executive instruction was given to staff
to remove the dated displays and numerous fixed wall
panels of the disbanded S A Cultural History M u s e u m
on the ground floor to be warehoused elsewhere so that
more space could be made available for exhibitions that
would be in line with Iziko's transformation agenda.
Staff responded with enthusiasm to the directive and
with the goodwill of the functionaries of the D P W in
the Western Cape additional funds were readily made
available for appropriate renovations inside the build
ing which included ramps for the physically challenged.
The launch of the refurbished Slave Lodge building
coincided with the opening of a state of the art exhi
bition in mid-December 2003 sponsored fully by the
finance house Nedcor. The exhibition, Echoes From
The Lodge, which focused on domestic life at the Cape
and Batavia under the V O C with reference to the role
of slavery, was presented as a preliminary phase in the
development of the Slave Lodge as a site for the first
M u s e u m on Slavery in South Africa.
In the meanwhile the C E O assigned the task to
champion the initiative of establishing a M u s e u m on
Slavery at the Lodge to an Iziko curator of long stand
ing, Dr Gabeba Abrahams-Baybrooke. While a business
plan is being finalized the visitor figures have risen dra
matically from December 2003 as a result of not only
the Echoes From The Lodge exhibition. Since it closed
in September 2004, images of temporary exhibitions
related to the struggle for h u m a n rights and against
slavery made the refurbished Slave Lodge a concep
tual resource of challenge and change second to none
in the city. Hence, after the dismantling of the Echoes
From The Lodge exhibition Archbishop Desmond Tutu
opened his Peace Foundation's exhibition, Hands That
Shape Humanity, there in November 2004, while the
U N E S C O traveling exhibition on slavery, Lest We For
get, was opened in two adjacent rooms by Dr Allan Boe
sak in early December. O n Iziko's commemoration day
of the abolition of slavery, December 1, 1834, the event
was celebrated with the launch of a partnership between
Iziko, the Office of the Premier of the Western Cape
and Absa Bank to transform the representation of the
slave quarters at the Premier's official residence, Leeu-
wenhof. In mid-December 2004, on Reconciliation Day,
the Slave Lodge was the venue for a co-partnership event
of Iziko, the Western Cape provincial government and
the Freedom Park Trust to launch the first phase of the
development of the Slave Lodge as a M u s e u m of Slavery
with the opening of the D A C funded auditorium and an
accompanying audio-guide and brochure on the history
of the Slave Lodge. Equally exciting events symboliz
ing Iziko's vision for challenge and change happened in
2005, like the photo-documentary exhibition Visions
and Voices: Rights and Realities, and for 2006 an exhibi
tion on the Presidential Project, Operation Timbuktu.
CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION <* MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY 217
Since the study on which this report is based was
conducted, management of the Castle has not yet
changed hands from the Defence Force and its Castle
Control Board to the Department of Arts and Culture
as proposed in 2001. Conventional wisdom has it that
when it happens Iziko will be the key stakeholder on
behalf of the national department with other statutory
bodies and private enterprise in its transformation into
a unique visitor attraction that will be self-sufficient.
In the meanwhile the permanent exhibition of the
William Fehr Collection, managed by Iziko as an inher
ited legacy, had to remain intact in terms of the Loan
Agreement of 1952 while the adjacent 'Secunde House'
complex is used for administration purposes and the
G o o d Hope Gallery above as venue hire space. The lat
ter and some spaces below it were however creatively
and innovatively utilized in 2004 for the Democracy X
exhibition on which President Mbeki commented in the
visitors book: ' Very well-done; an excellent tribute to
what has been done & where w e come from!' N o w o n
der the Royal Academy Magazine of A u t u m n 2004 rated
it as one of the fifteen best exhibitions in the world.
Iziko S A National Gallery and
Nation-building
Under the strong leadership of its Director of Art Collec
tions, Marilyn Martin, the SA National Gallery contin
ued to present itself creatively as a public communica
tion med ium and site of Iziko, striving to correct through
images and events perceptions and understandings of it.
The issue of its pre-Iziko Miscast exhibition has n o w only
historical academic value and, unlike the archived 'Bush
m e n ' diorama of the South African M u s e u m , no longer
part of any discourse at Iziko.
Even more than before 2003, in the context of chal
lenge and change its permanent and temporary exhibi
tions have become a conceptual resource. N o wonder
that Iziko obtained a significant showcase at the new
Cape T o w n International Convention Centre with the
Art Collections Division responsible for installing not
only fine art but also social and natural history objects
in the cabinets. Also, at national level Iziko has made
a contribution by giving on loan seven of its Gerard
Sekoto paintings to the Constitutional Court in Johan
nesburg.
A further shift in becoming truly an Iziko African
M u s e u m of Excellence that empowers and inspires was
demonstrated in 2003 and 2004 with temporary exhi
bitions, in collaboration with others, such as the retro
spective one of the work of Gladys Mgudlandlu and the
University of Zurich exhibition of The Moon and Shoe
San drawings. In 2004 one of the most outstanding
highlights - without funding from Government - was
their Decade of Democracy exhibition that showcased
works of art made during the period 1994 - 2004 and
acquired by the Gallery. It was indeed the largest, most
comprehensive and representative exhibition of con
temporary South African art ever held under one roof.
Regarding the Gallery's acquisitions dilemma since
amalgamation, the Art Collections Division was appre
ciative that for the first time Iziko dedicated a budget in
2003 for acquisitions and that in the same year the D A C
granted Iziko a substantial amount for repatriation and
purchase of works by previously disadvantaged artists.
2l8 CHALLENGE AND TRANSFORMATION "" MUSEUMS IN CAPE T O W N AND SYDNEY
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