Robben Island Collection

On 24 September 1997, President Nelson Mandela officially opened the Robben Island Museum (RIM) as the first national museum in democratic South Africa. In this year, RIM’s Arts and Culture Dept invited a number of visual artists and musicians to participate in an artist-in-residency programme on the Island. Their brief was to use the arts to communicate RIM’s mission.

The Robben Island Collection is a small body of works produced during the 1997 artist-in residence programme. At the end of the residency, the works were exhibited in a prison cell on the Island under the title, ‘Engaging the Shadows’. Artists featured in the collection include Craig Parker, Garth Erasmus, Isaac Makeleni, Mustafa Maluka, Thami Kiti, Victor Peterson and Selvin November. The collection is housed at the UWC-RIM Mayibuye

Gallery