In the Mother City, the enormously successful 13th edition of the Investec Cape Town Art Fair 2026 has left behind an abundance of unmissable exhibitions. YLA has uncovered a selection of standout highlights: site-specific public art, a uniquely South African florilegium, a history-making collaboration, a ‘secret’ 18th-century Rococo building, and a privately funded art institution.
Exploded View at BlackBrick Gardens
Large Orange, 1974, painted steel
The public art exhibition Exploded View places South Africa’s “most famous and prolific sculptor”, Edoardo Villa, in dialogue with contemporary South African sculptors. Thanks to the vision and generosity of the hosts, Black Brick and the University of Pretoria, Cape Town audiences have the opportunity to engage with Villa’s work.
The artist, who died in Johannesburg in 2011 at the age of 95, never exhibited internationally and is most closely associated with Johannesburg.
A monumental exhibition with modest goals: “to challenge simplistic North–South divides” while “revealing African aesthetics and this moment in South Africa”, as the exhibition statement reads.
Exploded View is anchored by the location’s contemporary, deconstructed architecture. Its industrial aesthetic complements Chris Soal’s All That We Can’t Leave Behind while Robin Rhode’s Car Theft, Kamyar Bineshtarigh’s Panel Beaters Wall IV and Hedwig Barry’s Night Crumple nod to the once-gritty, fast-gentrifying neighbourhood.
Spread throughout the site, Exploded View: Edoardo Villa and 21st Century Sculpture is nothing short of mind-blowing. It ends 19 May 2026.
BlackBrick Gardens is located at 2 Roodehek Street, Cape Town.
Deep Waters at A4 Arts Foundation
Burning Bush, 2018 Perspex print, lightbox
“A4 Arts is the best I have seen” remarked a typically critical German collector in town for the Investec Cape Town Art Fair, over artisanal pastries at Lion’s Bread in Gardens.
The current exhibition, Deep Waters, tackles our times “with lucidity and poetry”. The show, which ends 28 March 2026, features work by Adel Abdessemed, Frédéric Bruly Bouabré, Margaret Bourke-White, Marcel Broodthaers, Nicholas Hlobo, Pieter Hugo, Santu Mofokeng, Thiago Rocha Pitta, Diana Vives, Lin Yilin, and others.
A4 Arts Foundation is located at 23 Buitenkant Street, District Six, Cape Town.
Reflections at the Old Townhouse
Photo by Petra Mason
Reflections at the newly reopened Iziko Old Townhouse Museum links historic collections with contemporary South African art. If you enjoy 18th-century Cape Rococo architecture and are drawn to works from the 17th century, the exhibition offers a richly rewarding dialogue between old masters and contemporary artists.
The Old Town House Museum is a gem that often gets overlooked, even though it marks the central point from which Cape Town, as we know it, originated.
Part of the Iziko Museums, the Old Townhouse is located at 6 Greenmarket Square, Cape Town Central.
The Grootbos Florilegium at Grootbos Nature Reserve
Image courtesy Grootbos Private Nature Reserve
The first contemporary African florilegium, located in remote Gansbaai, is housed at the Hannarie Wenhold Botanical Art Gallery on Grootbos Nature Reserve. Dedicated to contemporary botanical art, the Grootbos Florilegium honours Cape Fynbos and the Cape Floral Kingdom in the Southern Overberg, serving as a valuable botanical record of the region’s rare, endemic, and endangered plant life.
The Florilegium is a global collaboration featuring a rotating selection of carefully chosen botanical artists.
Entry to the gallery is via Grootbos Nature Reserve.
Magugu House at Mount Nelson
Image courtesy of the artist and Belmond Hotels.
Concept stores are the new curators. This landmark collaboration between Thebe Magugu’s fashion house and the Mount Nelson, a Belmond Hotel, sees the unveiling of the private Thebe Magugu Suite, a two-storey Afro-modernist sanctuary on Palm Avenue.
Layering artistry and heritage, the Magugu Suite features Afro-modernist masterpieces, including A Reverence Like No Other by painter Mmangaliso Nzuza. Adjacent to the suite, and part of an ongoing Thebe Magugu–Mount Nelson collaboration, the exhibition By Our Own Hands runs until the end of April.
The space will host new exhibitions every quarter, as well as movie screening nights.
Magugu House at the Mount Nelson, A Belmond Hotel, is located at 76 Orange Street, Gardens, Cape Town.
