A Glance into Public Memory: Which Public? Whose Memory? The Demise of Red Location Cultural Precinct

In 2021, the international award-winning South African Red Location Museum (RLM), situated within the Red Location Cultural Precinct and termed a 'national site of struggle' by Noero Wolff Architects, remains derelict. This paper is about the continuing narrative of state-built infrastructure being held hostage to community protests. It focuses on the museum and its depiction of the public/s that made Red Location. The intensity of community protest has had a significant impact on the Red Location Cultural Precinct with the museum's closure in 2013. As I shall argue in the paper, more attention should be paid to the questions of museum public/s and whose memory heritage projects intend to document. Furthermore, the place of cultural institutions such as township museums requires a review of the idea itself. Given this context, I discuss two intertwined narratives, one, the concept of the promise of infrastructure, and the second, the impact of politics on heritage.