South Africa Guide
Gauteng
National Cultural History Museum
Opening time: Daily 8am–4pm
Price: R8
Address: Visagie Street
This large, airy exhibition space is, like many public collections, gradually feeling its way in the new South Africa. Generous room is given to temporary displays, although this tends to give the museum a rather tentative air. The permanent exhibitions are interesting in themselves but seem a bit unconnected. They include "Access to Power", which displays and explains San rock art, and "People's Choice", where groups of local people, including township women's groups and schoolchildren, have been invited to select objects from the museum's vast collection of some three million pieces. Also here is a room showing work by J.H. Pierneef (1886–1957), one of the country's most famous artists, who is known for his dramatically stylized bushveld landscapes.