Current Review(s)
Other Faces
William Kentridge at Goodman GalleryThe city looms large in the headspace of its inhabitants, underpinning our sense of ourselves both as individuals and as part of a collective. The force and nature of the city is so compelling (the CIA’s World Factbook in 2010 estimated that 61% of South Africa’s population lives in cities; other sources estimate that this figure will rise to around 75% by 2030) that it induces an increasing number of artists to deal with its fabric, its terms and its effect on the psyches of those that live there.
In particular, Johannesburg seems to lay bare many of the conflicts at the heart of global diaspora and migration: economic competition, redefinition of space and territory, and a constant white noise of cultural friction. In his paper The Johannesburg Moment Professor Karl Von Holdt speaks of two major ways of thinking of Johannesburg. The first is as a contestation of ideas and power for influence, and control over spaces, institutions and sectors. The second way he views the city is as an intellectual and cultural project to reconfigure the lenses of Western ideology through which we make meaning of the city.
10 November 2011 - 23 December 2011
Five Themes
William Kentridge at AlbertinaVariations on a Theme: ‘William Kentridge: Five Themes’ and the Curious Dynamics of the Travelling Show
Originally conceived of and organised by the San Francisco MoMA in 2009, the massive travelling Kentridge retrospective ‘Five Themes’ has been on a sojourn through Fort Worth, West Palm Beach, New York and Paris to its current destination in Vienna, with stopovers in Tel Aviv and Amsterdam still on the itinerary for 2011. The scale and scope of the show is unparalleled and its production slick, including over 130 works of drawing, sculpture, film, print, tapestry, anamorphic installation and theatre maquette, variously selected and shown by each institution (according to space requirements and curatorial decision), and all coalesced around five central themes developed in collaboration with the artist.
29 October 2010 - 30 January 2011
Oh, William is it Really Nihilism? A Review of 'No, it is'
William Kentridge at Goodman GalleryFrom the moment when the middle class society, as a result of the [French] revolution, became stabilized, a literature of revolt developed[…] the masses and the aristocracy – the two sources of civilization – took their stand against artificial society. – Albert Camus
Art in South Africa changed in 1989, the year the Berlin Wall fell. It changed when Albie Sachs, in that same year, proposed to the ANC to ban the phrase ‘culture is a weapon of struggle’. And the moment Gideon Mendel took out his camera, in 1989, to document the last death throes of Afrikaner nationalism in his work ‘Promised Land’, South African art was no longer the same. From that instant, art had shifted from the art of protest - underpinned by agitprop - to art concerned with documenting and explicating identity politics.
From Candice Brietz’s ‘Ghost Series’, to Zwelethu Mthethwa’s photographic colour portraits, to Kendell Geer’s ‘Self-Portrait’, to Churchill Madikida’s ‘Liminal States’, to William Kentridge’s ‘Felix in Exile’, art’s concerns, post-1989, were not about struggle but about fault lines. Art was no longer a protest against overt ideology, but became, instead, a probing into racial, communal, political and social identity and difference. And whatever the faults of this approach were, they still largely upheld the notion in Camus’ statement quoted above: they were still a revolt against the artificiality of society.
18 December 2012 - 02 February 2013
Listings(s)
Editions for ArtThrob Print Exhibition
Guy Tillim, Jane Alexander, Lisa Brice, Peet Pienaar, David Goldblatt, Penny Siopis, Hentie van der Merwe, Robert Hodgins, Tracey Rose, Mikhael Subotzky, William Kentridge, Zwelethu Mthethwa and Nontsikelelo Veleko at South African Print GalleryEditions for ArtThrob is pleased to announce an exhibition of all artist prints in our collection at the South African Print Gallery in Woodstock, Cape Town. You are cordially invited to attend the opening finger lunch at 11:30am on Saturday the 29th of August, where all available prints will be for sale.
Editions for ArtThrob, in collaboration with South Africa’s leading artists, has developed a series of specially-commissioned prints; these are sold to cover the running costs of the ArtThrob website. ArtThrob is South Africa’s leading website on contemporary art, and is an important point of reference worldwide for curators, dealers and those interested in South African art.
Artists who have participated in the in the print program include William Kentridge, Penny Siopis, Robert Hodgins, Jane Alexander, Willem Boshoff, Nontsikelelo ‘Lolo’ Veleko, David Goldblatt, Guy Tillim, Lisa Brice, Zwelethu Mthethwa, Mikhael Subotzky, Peet Pienaar, Hentie van der Merwe and Tracey Rose.
In addition, we will be launching a brand new print by Robert Hodgins. Hot off the presses at Mark Attwood’s studio, the image will be available for preview the at exhibition opening.
Please contact Natasha Norman from ArtThrob for online orders or Gabriel Clark-Brown at the SA Print Gallery for more information.
29 August 2009 - 28 September 2009
'Putting the 'S' into Laughter'
William Kentridge at The University of Cape Town’s Gordon Institute for Performing and Creative Arts (GIPCA)William Kentridge is the guest speaker at UCT’s Gordon Institute for Performing and Creative Arts (GIPCA)’s 'Great Text / Big Questions' public lecture on Thursday 8 April. He will give a lecture titled ‘Putting the ‘S’ into Laughter’, looking at Gogol’s short story The Nose (written in 1836), which is the basis for Kentridge's production of Shostakovich’s opera The Nose which premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in New York earlier this month.
There is no charge to attend but space is limited. To reserve a seat for the 17h00 lecture, email Ashley Miles on ash.miles@uct.ac.za.
08 April 2010 - 08 April 2010
'Darkroom: Photography and New Media in South Africa since 1950'
Sue Williamson, David Goldblatt, Roger Ballen, Santu Mofokeng, Jurgen Schadeberg, Tracey Rose, William Kentridge, Zwelethu Mthethwa and Nontsikelelo Veleko at Virginia Museum of Fine ArtsAn exhibition that considers photography’s role in South Africa’s composite transformation, Darkroom: Photography and New Media in South Africa since 1950 includes 18 artists who span four generations, including Jürgen Schadeberg, Santu Mofokeng, Andrew Tshabangu, David Goldblatt, Sue Williamson, Thando Mama, Zwelethu Mthethwa, Nontsikelelo Veleko and William Kentridge.
The exhibition's eight sections highlight the ways that these artists have addressed South African culture from various perspectives, and their increased presence in the global art world since 1994. 'The social and political transformation of South Africa is one of the most remarkable stories of the second half of the twentieth century,' says Alex Nyerges, director of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. 'To engage with it directly through the eyes of those who experienced and documented the anguish, turmoil and elation of the period is both uplifting and thought-provoking.'
21 August 2010 - 24 October 2010
'Alias' - Photomonth Krakow 2011
Ivan Vladislavic, Lisa Brice, Sean O Toole, David Goldblatt and William Kentridge at Various venues around KrakowPhotomonth is one of Poland's largest visual arts events and one of the leading European festivals of photography, comprising over fifty exhibitions and accompanying events. For the 2011 edition, curatorial team Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin, who exhibited a photographic project at the event last year, have invited artists and writers to collaborate in pairs to create a fictive third persona.
Broomberg and Chanarin explain:
'Twenty-three writers (of fiction, fact and medical history) were each commissioned to create a text describing an invented persona, which was then assigned to a visual artist to inhabit. The work that accompanies these texts is the result of each individual artist’s residency in their fictitious character. It’s an experiment that was set up to fail, because it shouldn’t be that easy to stop being yourself; to break with your own particular political and ethical concerns. Yet most of the artists we approached bravely took up the challenge...'
13 May 2011 - 12 June 2011
'Impressions from South Africa, 1965 to Now'
Sue Williamson, John Muafangejo, Cameron Platter, Sandile Goje, Senzeni Marasela, William Kentridge, Kudzanai Chiurai, Claudette Schreuders and Bitterkomix at MoMADuring the oppressive years of apartheid rule in South Africa, not all artists had access to the same opportunities. But far from quashing creativity and political spirit, these limited options gave rise to a host of alternatives—including studios, print workshops, art centers, schools, publications, and theaters open to all races; underground poster workshops and collectives; and commercial galleries that supported the work of black artists—that made the art world a progressive environment for social change. Printmaking, with its flexible formats, portability, relative affordability, and collaborative environment, was a catalyst in the exchange of ideas and the articulation of political resistance.
Drawn entirely from the collection of The Museum of Modern Art, 'Impressions from South Africa, 1965 to Now' features nearly 100 posters, books, and wall stencils created over the last five decades that demonstrate the exceptional reach, range, and impact of printmaking during and after a period of enormous political upheaval. From the earliest print in the exhibition, made in 1965 (the Museum’s first acquisition of work by a South African artist), to printed posters from the height of the antiapartheid movement in the 1980s, to projects by a younger generation that reflect new and evolving artistic concerns, these works are striking examples of printed art as a tool for social, political, and personal expression.
23 March 2011 - 14 August 2011
'Refuse the Hour'
William Kentridge at Market TheatreWilliam Kentridge’s latest production ‘Refuse the Hour’, created with a host of collaborators is, impressing audiences and getting Johannesburg into the mood for the Joburg Art fair later this month. The production runs from 6 to 18 September. On 17 September the performance will include a dance concert with Dada Masilo and music by Philip Miller, with a series of mechanical drums and ‘ten or more musicians’.
06 September 2011 - 18 September 2011
'Other Faces'
William Kentridge at Goodman GalleryWilliam Kentridge’s 'Other Faces' has been drawn and filmed over the past year. It will be shown at Goodman Gallery Johannesburg in conjunction with a group of working drawings used in the film’s animation, as well as drawing fragments and prints.
As with other films in the 'Drawings for Projection' series, the artist uses a 35mm movie camera to film the successive stages of charcoal drawings that are progressively altered through erasure and overdrawing. 'Other Faces' returns to the figure of Soho Eckstein, the industrialist and developer who is the key protagonist of the 'Drawings for Projection' series. In this cycle of nine films created from 1989 through 2003, Kentridge addresses the doubling and contrary sides of the self, personified in the entrepreneur/capitalist Soho and his foil, the poet/lover Felix.
10 November 2011 - 23 December 2011
'William Kentridge: Five Themes'
William Kentridge at Albertina'William Kentridge: Five Themes' is a comprehensive survey of the artist's work, featuring more than 60 works in a range of media including animated films, drawings, prints, theatre models, sculptures, and books. In close collaboration with the artist, the exhibition explores five primary themes that have engaged Kentridge over the past three decades. Although the exhibition highlights projects completed since 2000, it will also present, for the first time, Kentridge's most recent work alongside his earlier projects from the 1980s and 1990s - revealing as never before the full arc of his distinguished career.
The exhibition is co-organized by SFMOMA and the Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach, Florida.
29 October 2010 - 30 January 2011
'Contemporary Art/South Africa'
Sue Williamson, Gavin Jantjies, Robin Rhode, Santu Mofokeng and William Kentridge at Yale University Art Gallery'Contemporary Art/South Africa' features more than 30 artworks produced in South Africa or by South Africans from the late 1960s to the present, a period of immense political and social change. The artists in this exhibition—including Gavin Jantjes, William Kentridge, Santu Mofokeng, Zanele Muholi, Robin Rhode, and Sue Williamson—address key aspects of the experiences of South Africans, offering multiple perspectives on their lives, their society, and their world. Contemporary Art/South Africa features a small but growing body of South African artworks acquired in recent years by the Yale University Art Gallery, alongside loans from public and private collections. Organized by Yale students, the exhibition highlights the vibrancy of South African culture and society, and it invites viewers to question whether it is possible to understand a country through the art it has produced, and to understand contemporary art through the country in which it was made.
Exhibition organized by Yale University students under the mentorship of Kate Ezra, the Nolen Curator of Education and Academic Affairs. Made possible by the Jane and Gerald Katcher Fund for Education; the John F. Wieland, Jr., B.A. 1988, Fund for Student Exhibitions; and the Nolen-Bradley Family Fund for Education.
09 May 2014 - 14 September 2014
'Three Artists at the Caversham Press: Deborah Bell, Robert Hodgins and William Kentridge'
Robert Hodgins, Deborah Bell and William Kentridge at Boston University Art GalleryPresented concurrently with 'South Africa: Artists, Prints, Community - 25 Years at the Caversham Press' at Boston University’s 808 Gallery, this companion exhibition features the work of three South African artists who were important participants in the early years of The Caversham Press. Bell, Hodgins, and Kentridge forged long-term relationships with both Caversham and with each other, leading to the creation of three collaborative print portfolios - Hogarth in Johannesburg (1986), Little Morals (1990-91), and Ubu Tells the Truth (1996-97) - as well as numerous individual prints.
Together, the works reflect Caversham’s early history and articulate the artists’ personal perspectives of living and creating in South Africa in the years between late apartheid and the transition to a new democracy. The exhibition comprises over 65 works, presenting selections from the three collaborative portfolios, and individual prints, including the debut of three new William Kentridge prints created specifically for the exhibition.
08 February 2011 - 26 March 2011
