Art museums can help to promote art in society, but not all artists have their work selected for permanent collections or temporary exhibitions, and museums may be isolated from society. In Europe and North America, the primary function of museum libraries is to serve the parent institution, thereby serving the wider community only indirectly. In South Africa, where there are comparatively fewer museums, libraries, and publications concerned with the visual arts, and where there are so many disadvantaged people, it is vital that special collections such as the South Africa National Gallery (SANG) Library collection are made accessible in the widest possible sense and that museum library information programmes should be directed externally, as well as internally to the museum staff.
Challenging vision in Visual Arts in the South African sociocultural context
