Press release - December 2010
Faustus in Africa! forms part of three plays created in collaboration with Handspring Puppet company in the 1990s. These works re-interpreted European literary classics through an African lens and investigate humanity viscerated by political greed; Woyzeck on the Highveld (1992), Faustus in Africa! (1994) and Ubu and the Truth Commission (1996). “Faustus in Africa!, based on Goethe’s megaplay, showed the African underbelly of the European “enlightenment”: Kentridge’s Faust sold his soul in return for being able to plunder Africa and enslave its peoples.”1
“A sense of belonging to a cultural ‘periphery’ of Europe, and therefore a geographic distance from a ‘centre’, is translated into the visual imagery of objects that represent a historical distance from today’s accoutrements. The clothes, telephones, type-writers and other items in his animated drawings recall an early 20th century colonial world as perceived by a child in the 1950s and 60s looking at illustrated books from the 1940s.”2
“The productions are characterised by the interrelationship and complex layering of different types of representation and narration: projected images, actors and puppets are all on stage at once and the audience is constantly shifting its attention between them. In this complex experience of different personae, the subject is not univocal or clear, but multiple, shifting.“3
1 Blumenthal, Eileen, (2010) William Kentridge: Frame by Frame, American Theatre, p 5.
2 Christov-Bakargiev, Carolyn (ed.). (1998) William Kentridge, Brussels: Société-des Expositions
du Palais des Beaux-Arts, p 11
3 Christov-Bakargiev, Carolyn (ed.). (1998) William Kentridge, Brussels: Société-des Expositions
du Palais des Beaux-Arts, p 18
William Joseph Kentridge (South African 1955-)
FLYING BOAT (FROM FAUSTUS IN AFRICA!)
signed charcoal and pastel on paper 56 by 76cm (1) Faustus in Africa! forms part of three plays created in collaboration with Handspring Puppet company in the 1990s. These works re-interpreted European literary classics through an African lens and investigate humanity viscerated by political greed; Woyzeck on the Highveld (1992), Faustus in Africa! (1994) and Ubu and the Truth Commission (1996). “Faustus in Africa!, based on Goethe’s megaplay, showed the African underbelly of the European “enlightenment”: Kentridge’s Faust sold his soul in return for being able to plunder Africa and enslave its peoples.”1 “A sense of belonging to a cultural ‘periphery’ of Europe, and therefore a geographic distance from a ‘centre’, is translated into the visual imagery of objects that represent a historical distance from today’s accoutrements. The clothes, telephones, type-writers and other items in his animated drawings recall an early 20th century colonial world as perceived by a child in the 1950s and 60s looking at illustrated books from the 1940s.”2 “The productions are characterised by the interrelationship and complex layering of different types of representation and narration: projected images, actors and puppets are all on stage at once and the audience is constantly shifting its attention between them. In this complex experience of different personae, the subject is not univocal or clear, but multiple, shifting.“3 I.H. 1 Blumenthal, Eileen, (2010) William Kentridge: Frame by Frame, American Theatre, p 5. 2 Christov-Bakargiev, Carolyn (ed.). (1998) William Kentridge, Brussels: Société-des Expositions du Palais des Beaux-Arts, p 11 3 Christov-Bakargiev, Carolyn (ed.). (1998) William Kentridge, Brussels: Société-des Expositions du Palais des Beaux-Arts, p 18
EXHIBITED
34 on Long Gallery, Cape Town
R 400 000 - 600 000 |
