Apartheid Museum

Apartheid Museum Pre-eminent museum dealing with 20th century South Africa. World-class exhibitions for local & international guests. Learn from the past. Change the future.
(634)

A night for a living legend.On Saturday evening, we opened John Kani: A Living Legend, an exhibition celebrating six dec...
01/09/2026

A night for a living legend.

On Saturday evening, we opened John Kani: A Living Legend, an exhibition celebrating six decades of Dr John Kani's work in performance, playwriting, and social justice. The evening brought tributes from friends and colleagues who have worked alongside him.

The launch fell on the eve of his birthday, with the exhibition opening to the public the following morning. A fitting way to mark a career that has shaped South African theatre and carried our stories to the world.

Thank you to everyone who joined us.

On display until 30 November 2026.

www.apartheidmuseum.org

The Apartheid Museum extends its warmest birthday wishes to our Chairman, Dr John Kani.For more than 25 years, Dr Kani h...
30/08/2026

The Apartheid Museum extends its warmest birthday wishes to our Chairman, Dr John Kani.

For more than 25 years, Dr Kani has helped guide the Apartheid Museum with vision, wisdom and an unwavering commitment to preserving our history and ensuring that its lessons continue to speak to future generations.

His extraordinary contribution to South African theatre, storytelling and social justice has made him one of our country’s most respected cultural figures - but it is his enduring commitment to truth, memory and the power of our stories that remains at the heart of his remarkable legacy.

It is a privilege to celebrate this milestone alongside the opening of John Kani: A Living Legend, an exhibition honouring six decades of performance, playwriting and social conscience.

Happy Birthday, Dr Kani.



The exhibition John Kani: A Living Legend runs from 30 August to 30 November 2026, celebrating six decades of his work in performance, playwriting and social justice.

Tonight, we honour a living legend. The Apartheid Museum is proud to celebrate the extraordinary life, legacy and contri...
29/08/2026

Tonight, we honour a living legend.

The Apartheid Museum is proud to celebrate the extraordinary life, legacy and contribution of Dr John Kani - actor, playwright, director, storyteller and one of South Africa’s most important cultural voices.

This evening marks the official opening of the John Kani Exhibition, while also celebrating Dr Kani’s birthday - a fitting tribute to a man whose work has challenged, inspired and helped tell the story of South Africa to the world.

A night of reflection. A night of celebration. A legacy that continues to shape generations.

John Kani built his career in the crucible of apartheid protest theatre, using the stage to tell stories the system trie...
26/08/2026

John Kani built his career in the crucible of apartheid protest theatre, using the stage to tell stories the system tried to suppress.

Through the Serpent Players in New Brighton and the Market Theatre in Johannesburg, which hosted multiracial audiences before they were legal, Kani's work as actor and playwright became a form of cultural resistance.

The plays Sizwe Banzi Is Dead and The Island brought the human cost of apartheid to audiences around the world, earning Kani and Winston Ntshona a Tony Award in 1975. Oliver Tambo, watching a performance in London in 1973, said: "What you did tonight in this production is what we've been trying to do for over thirty years: to explain how the system of apartheid is inhuman."

The temporary exhibition, John Kani: A Living Legend, is open at the Apartheid Museum from 1 September to 30 November, celebrating six decades of performance, playwriting, and social justice. Come and experience it.

Plan your visit: www.apartheidmuseum.org

22/08/2026

NEW EXHIBITION
JOHN KANI: A LIVING LEGEND

WATCH this clip of John Kani describing growing up in New Brighton township in Port Elizabeth in the 1950s.

For over 25 years, Dr John Kani has helped guide the direction of the Apartheid Museum, an institution whose mandate overlapped uncannily with that of his own plays.

His role as chairman of the Board of Trustees unfolded parallel to his development as a playwright, an art form through which the veteran actor began to ask pertinent questions about the shortfalls of democracy and reconciliation in a society that remains unequal.

From 30 August until 30 November, the Apartheid Museum will honour Kani’s contribution to the institution with an exhibition that revisits key moments in a stage and screen career that, over six decades, has taken him from Port Elizabeth rehearsal rooms to Hollywood studios.

Drawing on images, text, artefacts, and film, the exhibition showcases the ideas that have occupied Kani on and off the stage, informing his vision as a mentor and visionary.

© Apartheid Museum & Full Circle Productions

-








Albertina Nontsikelelo Sisulu, known as the Mother of the Nation, was one of the most enduring figures in the fight agai...
20/08/2026

Albertina Nontsikelelo Sisulu, known as the Mother of the Nation, was one of the most enduring figures in the fight against apartheid. A nurse and lifelong activist, she was among the organisers of the 1956 Women's March to the Union Buildings and a founding member of the Federation of South African Women.

When her husband, Walter Sisulu, was sentenced to life imprisonment at the Rivonia Trial in 1964, Albertina became the sole breadwinner for a large household, continuing to organise and lead under persistent banning orders and security police surveillance. She served as co-president of the United Democratic Front through the 1980s, and in 1989, newly granted a 31-day passport, led a delegation to meet British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, the first such meeting between a British Prime Minister and ANC representatives since 1919.

In 1994, Albertina and Walter were both elected to South Africa's first democratic Parliament. She died on 2 June 2011, at the age of 92.

Explore her story in A Life of Fire & Hope, the Apartheid Museum's centenary exhibition dedicated to her life: www.apartheidmuseum.org/exhibitions/a-life-of-fire-hope-1

© Gisele Wulfsohn

Ruth First was a journalist, author, scholar, and one of the most formidable voices against apartheid. Through investiga...
17/08/2026

Ruth First was a journalist, author, scholar, and one of the most formidable voices against apartheid. Through investigative journalism, political organising, and writing that reached audiences far beyond South Africa's borders, she exposed the realities of the apartheid state. In 1963, she became the first white woman detained under the 90-Day Detention Law, spending 117 days in solitary confinement at the Johannesburg Fort.

Unable to silence her, the apartheid security police arranged her murder. On 17 August 1982, a letter bomb sent by operatives Craig Williamson and Jerry Raven detonated in her office at Eduardo Mondlane University in Maputo. Two years later, Williamson ordered another letter bomb, killing activist Jeanette Schoon and her six-year-old daughter Katryn in Angola. In 2000, the TRC granted both men amnesty, a decision contested by the victims' families.

Ruth First was never able to see the South Africa she fought for. Today, we honour her.

Visit the Apartheid Museum to learn more about those who gave their lives in the fight for democracy.

www.apartheidmuseum.org

On 9 August 1956, four women stepped to the front of a march of 20 000. They came from different communities, different ...
14/08/2026

On 9 August 1956, four women stepped to the front of a march of 20 000. They came from different communities, different backgrounds, and different corners of South Africa, but they stood together as the leaders of one of the most powerful acts of resistance in the country's history.

Lilian Ngoyi, Helen Joseph, Rahima Moosa, and Sophia Williams De Bruyn came together under the banner of the Federation of South African Women, the organisation that had spent years building the networks, collecting the petitions, and organising the women who would converge on Pretoria. Long before that day, each had already committed herself to the struggle. Long after it, each would carry the cost of that commitment.

This Women's Month, on the 70th anniversary of the march, we honour the women who led the way. Visit the Apartheid Museum to explore their stories.

www.apartheidmuseum.org

09/08/2026

On 9 August 1956, an estimated 20 000 women from across South Africa converged on the Union Buildings in Pretoria. They came in manyano uniforms, saris, and their Sunday best. They delivered petitions bearing more than 100 000 signatures. When Prime Minister Strijdom refused to meet them, they stood in silence for thirty minutes, arms raised. Then they sang: Wathint'abafazi, Wathint'imbokodo. “You strike a woman, you strike a rock.”

Seventy years on, the march remains one of the most powerful acts of mass resistance in South Africa's history, and the reason 9 August is commemorated as National Women's Day. The courage of those 20 000 women, coming from every corner of the country and every walk of life, gave the struggle one of its most enduring symbols.

However the struggle for women's freedom is far from over. Gender-based violence, economic inequality, and the persistent gap between the rights enshrined in the Constitution and the daily realities of women's lives mean that the spirit of 9 August 1956 remains as urgent today as it was then.

Explore a century of women's courage and resistance at our temporary exhibition, Our Triumphs and Our Tears: Women's Struggles in 20th Century South Africa, on display until 16 August 2026.

Free entry for all South Africans today, 9 August.

www.apartheidmuseum.org

07/08/2026

"We have to carry passes which we abhor because we cannot have houses without them, we cannot work without them, we are endorsed out of towns without them, we cannot register births without them, we are not even expected to die without them." - Winnie Mandela

South Africa's notorious pass book, the dompas, reached into every corner of black women's lives under apartheid. It recorded who you were, where you were permitted to live, who you were permitted to work for, and whether you had the legal right to be standing in the place you stood. Without the right entries and stamps, you could be removed from your home, separated from your family, and deported to a rural homeland.

This Women's Month, as South Africa marks 70 years since 20 000 women marched on the Union Buildings in Pretoria, the Apartheid Museum reflects on what they were marching against, and why.

Visit our temporary exhibition Our Triumphs and Our Tears: Women's Struggles in 20th Century South Africa, on display until 16 August 2026.

www.apartheidmuseum.org

Address

Cnr Northern Park Wy & Gold Reef Road
Kempton Park
2001

Opening Hours

Wednesday 09:00 - 17:00
Thursday 09:00 - 17:00
Friday 09:00 - 17:00
Saturday 09:00 - 17:00
Sunday 09:00 - 17:00

Telephone

+27113094700

Website

,

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Apartheid Museum posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Contact The Museum

Send a message to Apartheid Museum:

Shortcuts

Share

Category