​​​As the world celebrates International Museum Day on Tuesday, 18 May, the City invites residents to mark the auspicious occasion by visiting public museums and galleries.

To celebrate the day, the municipality is taking a group of local creatives, cultural expressionists and social media influencers on a daylong tour of local museums. They will go on a walkabout of a selection of museums, including the Johannesburg Art Gallery (JAG), Museum Africa, the Workers Museum and the James Hall Transport Museum to explore the City’s socio-cultural heritage.

Joburg museums and galleries house and exhibit a large collection of various works of art, scientific specimens and other objects of permanent historical value. They are the guardians of the City’s socio-cultural heritage. On the day, each museum will present a uniquely curated experience of its historical collections.

The full-day itinerary, which starts at JAG with a light canapé breakfast followed by a guided tour of the iconic gallery will also include local sightseeing atop the red open-top bus. Guests will later be ferried to Newtown for a tour of Museum Africa as well as the Workers Museum. The final tour is of the country’s largest and most comprehensive museum of land transport, the James Hall Transport Museum in Pioneers Park, southern Joburg.

Throughout the day-long tour, patrons will enjoy paintings, literature, historical architecture and heritage, as well as music. They will later be treated to a gourmet picnic at the James Hall Transport Museum’s tree-shaded porch.

“A picnic set-up will be prepared, paired with a curated music selection by upcoming live bands and DJs,” says Vincent Maumela, the City’s Executive Director for Arts, Culture and Heritage.

Observed every year on 18 May, International Museum Day is designed to celebrate history, culture and heritage by allowing museums to showcase their collections to the public free of charge. It was established by the International Council of Museums (ICOM) in 1977 to increase public awareness of the role of museums in the development of society.

Themed the ‘Future of Museums: Recover and Reimagine,’ this year’s occasion calls for the creation of new forms of cultural expression and dissemination. With digitisation gaining momentum in light of the 4th Industrial Revolution (4IR), museums across the globe are being challenged to reconsider their relationship with society.

Maumela says museums and galleries play a pivotal role in the comprehension and contemplation of life and death and should be preserved for posterity.

He concedes that the Covid-19 pandemic has allowed for an early transition to crucial technological innovations needed by museums of the future.

“To reaffirm their essential value in the construction of a just and sustainable future, museums need to experiment with new and hybrid models of cultural production,” he says.

Despite the countless limitations imposed by the Covid-19 lockdown, the ICOM reports that more than 83 000 000 people in about 158 countries and territories visited over 37 000 museums through digital platforms.

“This is a relevant time to promote a museum-going culture amongst young people and to give youngsters the power to re-write their narrative and reclaim and re-imagine their heritage at a time when culture is dynamic and constantly changing,” Maumela enthuses.