William Kentridge
Makes films by drawing in charcoal, photographing, erasing and redrawing the same sheet.
William Kentridge was born in Johannesburg in 1955 to two lawyers who acted against the apartheid state, and studied politics and African studies before theatre in Paris. His animation method is deliberately primitive and physically laborious: a charcoal drawing is photographed, partly erased, redrawn and photographed again, so the finished film carries the smudged ghost of everything that came before it. The Drawings for Projection, following Soho Eckstein and Felix Teitlebaum through the end of apartheid, are the central work. He also directs opera, makes tapestries, sculpture and enormous processional friezes.
The residual charcoal drawings from the films are the most sought unique works and are physically among the most vulnerable objects in contemporary art — unfixed or barely fixed charcoal that cannot be cleaned and that abrades on contact, so glazing and handling history are decisive. Film editions are sold with their equipment and documentation, and completeness matters. Kentridge is also a serious and prolific printmaker in etching, drypoint, linocut and letterpress, often over found book pages, and those editions are the accessible part of the output.
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