A History of the Iziko South African National Gallery: Reflections on Art and National Identity, by Anna Tietze

Abstract

Towards the end of her book, Anna Tietze comments that “a prescriptive stress on nation building” (as required by the 2013 Revised White Paper on Arts, Culture and Heritage) should be balanced by “a concern with what has already been built, in the near or distant past, and especially a concern with those pasts that do not harmonise with current orthodoxy” (p. 202). An accurate, detailed documentation of those pasts is indeed essential for our understanding of the present and future. This is what Tietze sets out to do in her book. Her impeccable archival research, arrangement of the text, and handling of contentious issues make this an important contribution to the history of public institutions in South Africa, and to reflections on art and national identity in general. Tietze constructs the body of her text in accordance with the tenures of different directors (or governance structures) and their impact on the development of the collections and policies. She bookends her five chapters with a lengthy introduction and conclusion in which she discusses issues which are often controversial but need to be voiced. One could quibble with how she discusses classificatory boundaries (fine art versus design, fine art versus craft),1 her overview of western art galleries (or museums),2