Founded by the German businessman Jochen Zeitz and a partner of Victoria and Alfred Waterfront, Zeitz MOCAA is more than a museum. The 100,000-square-foot space, the largest on the continent, encompasses a Costume Institute as well as Centres for Photography, Curatorial Excellence, Moving Image, Performative Practice and Art Education.
The Roger Ballen Foundation invests
Roger Ballen, Take Off. (2012)
Zeitz MOCAA announced that is has received an important donation from the Roger Ballen Foundation, which will support the Centre for Photography, which will be renamed after the American photographer, who has lived and worked in South Africa since the 1970s.
The donation — the most significant ever received by the museum — aims to finance the logistical costs of exhibitions and educational programming at the Centre for Photography.
The institution will also receive an edition of every work produced by Roger Ballen between 1968 and 1982, as well as an edition of every work produced by the artist from now until his death. “It has been my great desire to contribute to the understanding of photography in South Africa in the country that I call home,” said Ballen.
The Eiger Foundation, founded by Leonard O’Brien with the aim of promoting photography, is also linked to the project. The foundation is financing the creation of an “Eiger Foundation Curator of Photography” at Zeitz MOCAA, as well as donating further works by Ballen to the museum’s private collection.
The Roger Ballen Foundation Centre for Photography has been set up with the objective to “collect, preserve, research, and exhibit cutting edge contemporary photography, and artworks that use photography, from Africa and its Diaspora, to develop supporting educational and enrichment programs for all, and to encourage intercultural understanding and guarantee access for all,” it said in a mission statement. “The Centre will also exhibit temporary exhibitions of photographers from all over the world to expose local audiences and practitioners to the rich legacy of photography globally.”
A rendition of the project.
Azu Nwagbogu joins the project
Azu Nwagbogu, founder and director of Lagos Photo Festival, and director of the African Artist Foundation, — who gave his view of things to H A P P E N I N G here —, has been named Curator at Large of Photography at the Roger Ballen Foundation Centre for Photography. Gcotyelwa Mashiqa has been made AKO Foundation Assistant Curator of Photography.
For its inauguration this coming september, Zeitz MOCAA will show work by South African artists Mohau Modisakeng, Stefan Blom and Zanele Muholi, among others.
Curators Azu Nwagbogu and Gcotyelwa Mashiqa.
