The Museums of the University of Pretoria


The Van Tilburg Museum
In 1976 the University of Pretoria received a valuable collection of antiquities from a Dutch collector, Mr JA van Tilburg. He was a well-known businessman from Dordrecht in the Netherlands, who had built up a collection consisting of a large variety of valuable antique objects, and who had immigrated to South Africa in 1951, bringing his entire collection with him. Following his death in 1980 the University took delivery of the collection and it is now known as the JA van Tilburg Museum of the University of Pretoria and has been integrated into
the academic programmes of many of the teaching departments, thereby giving added value to many courses at the University. Approximately two thirds of the collection is housed in die Old Arts Building (rooms 2-9 to 2-13) on permanent exhibition.
The Van Tilburg Collection consists of three main sections: 93 pieces of antique furniture, 4018 paintings, drawings and etchings and 1699 pieces of Oriental ceramics. Heritage objects such as porcelain, furniture, household articles, Persian carpets, paintings and graphic work from Europe and the Far East are exhibited. This exhibition does not only aim to create an impression of the European way of life from the 17th to the 19th centuries, but it also illustrates the development of ceramics in China and Japan from the earliest times to the 19th century and highlights the contact of these cultures with Africa. Early Delft earthenware, 17th and 18th century Flemish-Dutch furniture and paintings form the nucleus of the European section of the collection, but it is especially the collection of Chinese and Japanese ceramics that makes this museum unique. It is not only the largest collection of Oriental ceramics in southern Africa, but it is also considered to be the largest in the southern hemisphere.


The Van Wouw Museum
Van Tilburg was particularly
The Van Wouw House on the corner of Clark and Rupert Streets in Brooklyn was the last home and studio of the famous pioneer South African sculptor, Anton van Wouw (1862-1945). The stand on which the house was built initially belonged to a Mr J Brookes and it changed ownership three times before it was sold to Van Wouw in 1937. He then commissioned the architect Norman Eaton to build him a house and studio on the southern property.
Norman Eaton completed the Van Wouw House towards the end of 1938. It was designed both as a residence and studio in his
personal style, which stressed the Arts and Crafts belief in the importance of the craftsman’s contribution to fine detail. The
house was built with face brick, has a thatch roof and wooden window frames with shutters. Terracotta tiles and wooden floors
add to its charm, while the large south-facing veranda gave a spectacular view over Waterkloof to the south. Eaton emphasized
the unity between building and environment by adding an ornamental pool in front of the house and surrounded the whole with climbing plants and a lush garden.
Van Wouw moved into his new home on 1st January 1939 and lived there until his death on 30th June 1945. The house was then occupied by Professor and Mrs S F Oosthuizen of the University of Pretoria until 1973. During the 25th Annual General Meeting of the Rembrandt Group on 16 November 1973, Dr Anton Rupert announced that a sum of money equal to the selling price of the property had been given to the University of Pretoria to purchase the Van Wouw House. Through this gesture, this valuable and exceptional house became the property of the University. Dr Rupert officially handed over the house to the University on 21 May 1974.

Over the years since 1974 the University of Pretoria has succeeded in bringing together the largest collection of Van Wouw sculptures in the world. The Van Wouw Collection of the University of Pretoria comprises 172 sculptures in plaster, bronze, marble and wood by Anton van
Wouw. Many of the works are unique because only a single casting orexample exists. Although Van Wouw is generally known for his monu mental sculptures such as the Kruger Monument in Pretoria and the Womens’ Memorial in Bloemfontein, it is rather his smaller works that more
clearly reflect his skill as a portrayer of the human figure. These works can be sub-divided into three groups namely his Boer studies such as Bad News, Kruger in Exile, Noitje van die Onderveld and many busts of Boer heroes, his African studies such as Zulu, The Mieliepap Eater, The Bushman Hunter, The Dagga Smoker, The Laughing Basutu, The Shangaan and many more and his Mining statuettes such as The Miner, The Hammer Worker and Miner with a Hammer-drill. Some of the unique works in the Van Wouw House Collection of the University of Pretoria include the seven wooden angel heads which Van Wouw carved for President Kruger’s hearse in 1904, a marble version of the Dopper Voortrekker, which is a marble version of one of the base-figures around the Kruger Monument, a statuette of President Steyn in an armchair, a statuette of Jan van Riebeeck, the founder of the Dutch colony at the Cape in 1652, a bust of Piet Retief , which was originally used for the portrayal of the Voortrekker leader at the Voortrekker Monument and a very rare bust of Mussolini, the Italian dictator.It is not only the intrinsic artistic

Mapungubwe Museum

The Mapungubwe Museum at the University of Pretoria is a dynamic archaeological collection serving its main purposes as a conservation, research and public information resource, essential to the interpretation and dissemination of knowledge on Mapungubwe in all its diversity. Mapungubwe is an African Iron Age kingdom that thrived in what is today the Limpopo Province between AD 1000 and 1300 and is found at the confluence of the
Limpopo and Shashe Rivers. The Mapungubwe collection consists of metal objects and fragments of gold, copper and iron, ivory, bone tools, animal bones, trade glass beads, marine and terrestrial shells, organic materials such as fragile fibres, seeds, charred sorghum and millet, clay figurines, a few dinosaur fossil remains, Chinese celadon fragments, low-fired ceramics and of course thousands upon thousands of potsherds.
The collection also includes a National Heritage collection consisting of 174 declared heritage objects associated with Iron Age settlements known as Mapungubwe Hill, the Southern Terrace, K2 and Bambandyanalo. These artefacts tell us the story of the people of Mapungubwe; how they lived, what adornments they wore, and what contact they had with other people and how their kingdom flourished and declined. The discovery was made in the early 1930’s by E S J van Graan, and was reported to the University of Pretoria. The Mapungubwe Museum was officially opened to the public in July 2000 and in 2008, the University of Pretoria celebrates its centenary and 75 years of involvement with Mapungubwe.

The museum serves as a custodian of original artefacts from Mapungubwe and K2, where they are not only exhibited, but care fully managed, researched and conserved so that future generations can also witness Mapungubwe’s heritage. The
Museum serves as a central point for all information on Mapungubwe used for marketing, education, and creates awareness to the public about our rich cultural heritage.



The Museum also contains the Mapungubwe Archives, documenting the University of Pretoria and Mapungubwe over 75 years. The Museum is dedicated to telling the story of our rich past and promotes South Africa’s heritage for the benefit of society and future generations. This treasured archaeological museum is a gentle reminder of the tremendous contribution of the University of Pretoria’s role in protecting our heritage.

The Edoardo Villa Museum

The Edoardo Villa Museum is located in the Old Merensky Library building on the main campus of the University of Pretoria. The building was designed by the South African architect, Gerard Moerdjik, and was inaugurated on 11 October 1937. The Old Merensky Library building has served many functions through the years, and on the occasion of Villa’s 80th birthday on 31 May 1995 it became the Edoardo Villa Museum.

The Edoardo Villa Museum
consists of a broad overview of Villa’s works in various mediums. The collection has eighteen steel artworks, dating between 1973
and 2001, many of which are displayed outside on the various campuses of the University of Pretoria. In the Museum itself the
collection there are eight bronze works, four large polystyrene works,sixteen charcoal sketches, one tapestry, three copper reliefs, and
131 plaster of Paris maquettes. Fifty per cent of these maquettes have never been cast in bronze. Outside the Museum there are six
large concrete reliefs that were created in Villa’s early sculpting days. They were originally made for a building in Johannesburg, and were subsequently saved from destruction and donated to the Museum by the Lupini family in October 1999.
Edoardo Villa was born in Bergamo, Italy in 1915, and studied at the Andrea Fortini Art School under Minotti, Barbieri and Lodi. He later continued his studies in Milan and Rome. While fighting in North Africa during the Second World War in 1942, he was wounded and brought to South Africa as a prisoner of war. He was held in the Zonderwater prison camp just outside Pretoria. During his captivity, under the encouragement of the welfare officer, Dr Zonabend, he started sculpting again, and created his first works in South Africa. Some of these works are represented in the Villa Museum, with the recent addition of his prison camp sculptures and the portrait study of Professor PR Kirby. Villa decided to stay in South Africa at the end of the Second World War. He was commissioned to do some work by Italian families while he created a foothold in the South African art scene. The previously mentioned concrete relief works date from this period in his career.

Villa has always been a very busy man and today at the age of 92 he still create sculptures to his heart’s content. His newest small steel works, due for exhibition on his next birthday in May 2008, will probably be exhibited in the Villa Museum as part of the centenary celebrations of the University of Pretoria.