10 magical months of Moad
MABONENG PRECINCT - Not even a year old, the Museum of African Design (Moad) has already hosted some of Joburg's most exciting events and exhibitions this year.
The museum on Commissioner Street was opened in October last year with the intention of bringing African art and design to a local and international audience.
“The upcoming calendar [will continue] to bring diverse programming with new exhibitions and projects,” said museum spokesperson Hayleigh Evans.
“With multiple happenings scheduled in the museum’s gallery spaces as well as offsite from August until December, visitors can expect several unforgettable experiences when stopping in at Moad.”
Following the close of the highly successful 21 Icons: Portrait of a Nation exhibition, the museum will host Rainbow Transit, a photographic exhibition by Per-Anders Pettersson.
“Off-site, an exploration of the concept of art and design storage will be presented in Unboxed at Aerial Empire on Sivewright Street,” she said.
The season’s calendar will include Young Architects from Germany, a travelling exhibition presented by the Goethe-Institut, as well as the Maker Faire Africa, to be hosted between the University of the Witwatersrand and the museum.
The past few months have seen museum director Aaron Kohn spend a week at the Garage Museum in Moscow, Russia.
“He was a participant in the Independent Curators International intensive workshop on new institutions in the art world,” said Evans.
The Garage Museum is Russia’s first institution dedicated to international contemporary arts.
The museum also got into the spirit of Mandela Day in July, and hosted a pop-up playground for children from the area.
Moad also successfully hosted the first Google Connected Classroom in South Africa in August, when the session at the 21 Icons exhibition was broadcast on YouTube to schools around the world.
“[We were] privileged to [work] with the Johannesburg Holocaust and Genocide Centre’s education team to develop a curriculum around the exhibition,” she said.
“Centre volunteer educators brought schools through the exhibition and a workshop based on the exhibition on a daily basis. Although the exhibition ended on 17 August, an app for iOS and Android devices was developed for the exhibition by Node JHB and can still be downloaded for free.”
Rainbow Transit will run until 28 September, Young Architects from Germany will run from 28 August until 21 September, and the Maker Faire Africa will run from 3 until 6 December.
Details: Moad, 281 Commissioner Street, Maboneng Precinct; www.moadjhb.com
WATCH: The 21 Icons Google Connected Classroom session:
