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Press release
For immediate release WILLIAM KENTRIDGE
Montréal, January 26, 2005. In a North American first, the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal presents William Kentridge from February 11 to April 24, 2005. Kentridge enjoys an international reputation and is regarded as one of the leading artists of our time for his examination of the recent cultural and political transformations that have occurred in South Africa and, more broadly, of the human condition. Through his drawings, animated films, sculptures and installations, as well as his stage work, Kentridge explores the nature of memory and human emotions, ambiguity and the complexity of social conflicts in this age of globalization. His works propose an incisive investigation of the changing notions of history and the sense of belonging to a place, and challenge the way our identities are forged through these successive alterations. Erasure The artist has captured the attention of international critics and audiences alike with the extraordinary animated short films he makes from his charcoal drawings. He has virtually revolutionized the art of animation through his unique process, which he refers to as “stone-age filmmaking,” and his technique of “erasure.” Unlike practitioners of traditional animation, which uses thousands of drawings, Kentridge creates his films from a small series of drawings—20 to 60 at the very most. Each drawing, corresponding to the final scene of a sequence, is progressively erased, redrawn and photographed at every stage of production. An animated narration emerges from the paper memory, in which dreamlike images intertwine and follow one another. His films are inhabited by archetypal figures, including the famous triangle formed by the characters of magnate Soho Eckstein, his wife, and the dreamer Felix Teitlebaum, all torn in the struggle between desire, ethics and responsibility. The exhibition The exhibition William Kentridge offers a retrospective of the artist’s entire body of work, with particular emphasis on his latest pieces. It includes more than 70 works: drawings, animated films and sculptures. Noteworthy among the major works on view are Felix in Exile (1994); the video/dresser installation Sleeping on Glass (1999); Shadow Procession (2000), made from cut-outs of black paper; Procession (2002), a series of 26 bronze sculptures; Medicine Chest (2001); Zeno Writing (2002); Fragments for Georges Méliès (2003) and Tide Table (2003). Kentridge’s earlier films produced since 1989 will also be screened in the Famille Guy Angers et Rougier Inc. Video Gallery. A new installation, conceived as a sort of archive room, presents old and new drawings related to various films, such as Mine (1991) and History of the Main Complaint (1996), along with prints and other objects created by the artist. William Kentridge was born in Johannesburg in 1955. After graduating from the University of the Witwatersrand with majors in politics and African studies in 1976, he studied at the Johannesburg Art Foundation, where he later taught printmaking. Since the early eighties, he has been much sought after for solo and group exhibitions. He has taken part in all the major contemporary art biennials: Johannesburg (1995), Sydney (1996), Havana (1997), Sao Paolo (1998), Venice and Istanbul (1999), and Kassel (2002). Throughout this time, he has also worked as an actor, set designer and, more recently, stage director. Since 1992, he has collaborated with the Handspring Puppet Company in creating multimedia pieces that use puppets, live actors and animation. Kentridge lives and works in Johannesburg. Montréal is the only North American stop for this exhibition organized and circulated by the Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, Rivoli, Turin, Italy. Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, chief curator of the Castello di Rivoli, organized the show and Sandra Grant Marchand, curator at the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, is responsible for the Montréal presentation. The MACM is a provincially owned corporation funded by the Ministère de la Culture et des Communications du Québec. It receives additional funding from the Department of Canadian Heritage and the Canada Council for the Arts. The exhibition William Kentridge has also received financial support from the Lichen advertising agency. -30-
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