More than a century of collecting, from Methven's first donation to Muholi's homecoming
By Durban Local History Museums
Historic photography has long formed part of the Durban Art Gallery's collecting focus
Tucked away on the second floor of Durban's grand City Hall, the Durban Art Gallery is easy to walk past without realising it holds one of South Africa's oldest and most wide-ranging public art collections. While our own network of local history museums focuses on the social and political history of the city, the Art Gallery tells a parallel story – of the artists, photographers and craftspeople who have documented and interpreted Durban and the wider region over more than a century.
From a single donated painting to a civic institution
The gallery's story begins in 1892, when Cathcart William Methven, a harbour engineer working in Durban at the time, donated one of his own paintings to the town council. That single gift became the seed of a permanent civic art collection. In 1920, the collection grew substantially when Colonel R. H. Whitwell, an art collector and philanthropist, presented the gallery with more than 400 works, shaping the character of its early collection of British and European art.
The gallery found its permanent home when the City Hall itself was built between 1906 and 1910, designed by architect Stanley G. Hudson in a grand Edwardian Neo-Baroque style modelled in part on Belfast's City Hall. Alongside the Mayor's Parlour, municipal council chambers, a public library and the Natural Science Museum, the Art Gallery has occupied its space within this landmark building for well over a century.
From the 1970s, the gallery broadened its collecting focus considerably, becoming one of the first public galleries in South Africa to recognise local craft and African material culture as fine art in its own right – a shift that opened the door to a far more representative collection of KwaZulu-Natal's artistic heritage.
A stage for South African photography
Photography has been a particular strength of the gallery's exhibition programme over the past two decades. Landmark shows have included:
- Homecoming (December 2017 – February 2018) – a solo exhibition of work by internationally renowned photographer and visual activist Zanele Muholi, marking their first solo show in KwaZulu-Natal and drawing on material first presented at PERFORMA in New York.
- Construct: Beyond the Documentary Photograph (September 2008 – January 2009) – a group exhibition bringing together major South African photographers including Roger Ballen, Zwelethu Mthethwa and Berni Searle.
- Unsettled: 8 South African Photographers (November 2005 – April 2006) – featuring some of the country's most acclaimed documentary photographers, among them David Goldblatt and Jodi Bieber.
- Roger Ballen, a dedicated solo exhibition (November 2005 – January 2006), and About Face (October 2006 – January 2007), a portraiture exhibition drawn from the gallery's own permanent collection.
Taken together, these exhibitions place the Durban Art Gallery firmly within the story of contemporary South African photography, alongside its long-standing role as custodian of historical painting, sculpture and craft.
Visiting the gallery
- Location: 2nd Floor, Durban City Hall, Smith Street, Durban, 4001
- Opening hours: Monday to Saturday, 8:30am – 4:00pm
- Entry to the gallery is free of charge
As with our own local history museums, the Durban Art Gallery is a reminder of how much of Durban's story is held within its public buildings – layered histories of collecting, donation and changing ideas about whose art and craft deserves to be seen. It's well worth a visit on any trip that takes in the museums of the inner city.
Source: exhibition history compiled from Photography-Now.com's institutional record for the Durban Art Gallery.