History
The Johannesburg Art Gallery collection was opened to the public in 1910, before the gallery itself had been built, and was housed at the University of the Witwatersrand. The architect, Sir Edwin Lutyens, came to South Africa in 1910 to examine the site and begin the designs, after Lady Florence Phillips had secured funding from the city for a purpose-built museum. The building was built with a South-facing entrance, but was not completed according to the architect's designs - no part of the museum was broken down to let in the light. It was opened to the public, without ceremony, in 1915 - just after the start of the First World War. The gallery was extended during the 1940s with East-West wings along the South galleries according to the Lutyens' design. The present North facade and galleries were constructed during the 1986/7 extension.
Read more about this topic: Johannesburg Art Gallery
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The history of this country was made largely by people who wanted to be left alone. Those who could not thrive when left to themselves never felt at ease in America.”
—Eric Hoffer (19021983)
“There is nothing truer than myth: history, in its attempt to realize myth, distorts it, stops halfway; when history claims to have succeeded this is nothing but humbug and mystification. Everything we dream is realizable. Reality does not have to be: it is simply what it is.”
—Eugène Ionesco (b. 1912)
“A man acquainted with history may, in some respect, be said to have lived from the beginning of the world, and to have been making continual additions to his stock of knowledge in every century.”
—David Hume (17111776)