I was wandering the streets last week, and I noticed there are two new galleries in town. Thought I might give my first impressions of each.

Firstly, on Kloof Street Salon 91 opened it's doors. It's one of the slickest chicest little spaces I have seen (and rightly so since it has been in renovation for 3 years), beautiful directional lighting, neutral-coloured wall panels, non-reflective flooring all with a decidedly expensive finish. It's tiny, like maybe 4 x 6, but it's hot. The first show there was a streety collaboration by Wesley Van Eerden and Senyol. A bit too much sand, water, one love for my taste and especially for hard-assed street artists, very little of the gritty fun that makes that stuff effective. Perhaps the tasteful gallery had something to do with it. I wonder if the gallery is going to struggle somewhat with it's identity, torn between supporting emerging artists (who I think as a young gallery will have to be thier staple) with edgy raw stuff or become more sales orientated to match the tasteful interior. I'm keen to see what happens.

Up in Vredehoek, I saw there is another new space called Muti Gallery. Wedged next to the 7/11 and the Fishery, the name immediately put me off, reminding me of the hosts of small shortlived galleries that Cape Town has seen with little motivation for existing except some vague notion of expressing creativity. Unfortunately the space was closed owing to it being a Monday, so I couldn't confirm my hasty judgement, but there did seem to be some really nice photography on the walls, so I hope I'm wrong. I think that it is the type of gallery that is going to have to push itself quite hard, in terms of promotion and marketing and branding and talking to the right people and sending out billions of invites and stuff, to get itself taken seriously. Partly because of its location, but partly because a new gallery needs a strong identity to break into the market. The space itself seemed clean and professional, with white walls and floors.