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Kentridge’s transformations of drawings into animated films strike me as dark expressionist landscapes, CT scans of a history of violent repression and memory, guilt and forgetting. –- Johannes Birringer
Through his animated films, theatrical productions, and graphic work, William Kentridge addresses the personal and social traumas that are the vestiges of South African apartheid. His ongoing series of short animated films Drawings for Projection (begun in 1989) feature two principal characters, who function as the artist’s alter egos: Soho Eckstein, an avaricious South African mining magnate in a pinstriped suit and tie, and Felix Teitlebaum, shown naked and vulnerable to apartheid’s devastating acts.
Kentridge created the sixth film History of the Main Complaint in 1996 during the initial hearings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, at which apartheid’s crimes were first publicly admitted while the perpetrators were granted indemnity in the hope of healing profound social and historical wounds in this post-apartheid society. In the film Soho lies comatose in a hospital ward, suffering from the weight of his past acts as well as those for which he is implicated due to his race and class. MRIs and CAT scans reveal his affliction, as memories of violence committed against black South Africans float across the screen. The relationship between individual and collective guilt is played out when Soho regains consciousness only through acknowledging his own responsibility. –- Guggenheim.com
Most of the films in this series, titled Drawings for Projection are set in the devastated landscape south of Johannesburg where derelict mine and factories, mine dumps and slime dams have created a terrain of nostalgia and loss. Kentridge’s repeated erasure and redrawing, which leave marks but not complete transformation, together with the jerky movement of the animation, operate in parallel with his depiction of human processes, both physical and political, enacted on the landscape and, in this film in particular, on human bodies. –- Elizabeth Manchester
In Felix in Exile, the fifth film of the series made between September 1993 and February 1994, Kentridge depicts the barren East Rand landscape as witness to the exploitation of and violence against both natural and human resources. Isolated in a hotel room, Felix peruses the survey charts of Nandi, a young black woman who maps the history of the terrain. Figures and structures are subsumed into the landscape or night sky, allegories for how the land can bear the scars of crimes against humanity. –- Guggenheim.com
Black Box / Chambre Noire consists of animated films, kinetic sculptural objects, drawings, and a mechanized theatre in miniature. In the work, Kentridge considers the term “black box” in three senses: a “black box” theatre, a “chambre noire” as it relates to photography, and the “black box” flight data recorder used to record information in an airline disaster. Kentridge explores constructions of history and meaning, while examining the processes of grief, guilt, culpability, and expiation, and the shifting vantage points of political engagement and responsibility. The development of visual technologies and the history of colonialism intersect in Black Box / Chambre Noire through Kentridge’s reflection on the history of the German colonial presence in Africa, in particular the 1904 German massacre of the Hereros in Southwest Africa (now Namibia). –- Maria-Christina Villaseñor
The filmic anamorphosis, What Will Come, draws on the idea of the picture puzzle that originated in the sixteenth century. Kentridge translates this play with perception that operates with distorted images that can only be deciphered from a certain angle to his film. The technique of cylinder mirror anamorphosis he employs is a special form of anamorphosis that is based on the addition of a further level of perception. It is not enough to change one’s point of view but a special seeing machine is essential to decode the picture: a cylindrical mirror with a certain radius that reflects the distorted image, “straightening” it “optically.” Producing such complicated distorted pictures requires a profound knowledge of mathematical rules and optical foundations. Relying on a special graphic grid, the preparatory sketch is transferred to the anamorphotic mode segment by segment, and the curvature of the mirror that is to correct the distortion has to be precisely calculated. –- outsidetheivorytower.blogspot.com
‘History of the Main Complaint is based on twenty-one drawings. It was made shortly after the establishment in South Africa of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, headed by Archbishop Desmond Tutu. It was set up to conduct a series of public hearings into abuses of human rights perpetrated during the apartheid era. The hearings, in which individuals told their stories of personal suffering, were held in order to make reparation for abuse and in the hope of creating reconciliation between peoples. The underlying theme of this film is a (self) recognition of white responsibility. This is played out through a ‘medical’ investigation into the body of Soho Eckstein, the white property-developing magnate and greedy-capitalist protagonist of most of the preceding films, which provides the starting point for a revelation of conscience.’ — tate.org.uk
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p.s. Hey. ** Ian, Hi. Yeah, I thought I’d drop that plumber’s videos into the mix of here and what happened. Oh, I see, about ‘Routine’. Awesome, that’s big — your first real work! Yeah, I too end up mapping out a bunch of stuff that I don’t end up using. Finding that balance between feeling prepared to go where you want to go and letting yourself break pre-set rules while writing is the place to be, I think. But, for me at least, the prep helps. Even knowing what is ultimately unnecessary or unfeasible is a plus. Anyway, great to talk with you about writing, and have an excellent today. ** Misanthrope, It sounds like that someone was a know-it-all. Quite a bit of nerve there to think he knows what hell would be. Oh, man, that’s not good about the leg swelling. Yeah, that needs to be assessed by experts. I hope it’s something that a med will get rid of. You can’t fuck around at her age, unfortunately. Let me know how it goes. Oh, god, taxes. Good to be reminded, I guess. It’s too easy to forget about that shit over here. ** David Ehrenstein, Thank you! ** Dominik, Hi!!!! Glad you dug it. It was kind of a trip to find those videos and approach them as someone who’s not just looking into their own pipes. I don’t know why Iggy got in there. It’s like … I almost never remember my dreams, but then I will one morning, and I’ll have dreamt about some super random person or celebrity or someone who I don’t even remember having thought consciously about. I thought about being specific with the anime but I hadn’t had my usual amount of coffee when I did the p.s. yesterday, and I didn’t trust my judgement. Speaking of, I think I have to go find ‘Sensitive Pornograph’, thank you for the tip. There was this young Japanese woman in Tokyo years ago who turned my first three novels into pornographic mangas, and that was cool. Yaoi love and Shota love having a crazed, live-streamed 24 hour PNP-fueled pay-per-view TikTok orgy as a SCAB benefit, G. ** Bill, You would almost have to be. I have seen those stories, yes, sir. Weekend starts tomorrow, or, even better, this evening. Hang in there. ** T, Hey, T. Me too, I agree re: the plumber’s thing. Strange, and yet not, isn’t it? An experimental filmmaker of my acquaintance sent me a link to Louis’s YouTube page, and the rest is history or at least a post. If I lived in Brussels, I would definitely hire him. Or maybe even hire him as a camera-person on Zac’s and my new film. No, I think the pipes are pretty small and tight, and he’s remote controlling it. Like, as someone else mentioned, colostomies, etc. I aim to find the perfect balance between the startling and the delightful, so thank you! ** Steve Erickson, Not that I know of, ha ha. Think it’s a cult, word of mouth kind of thing. Everyone, Two reviews by Steve for you today. (1) Stanley Kwan’s CENTER STAGE, and (2) A SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME. I loved serpentwithfeet’s first album, but, based on his recent EP, I’m a little concerned that the thrill of his thing might not have a lot of legs. I want to hear the new album, but I thought the last EP was a little too familiar. We had exterminators fill our apartment’s holes recently due to many mice constantly roaming about our place, and it kind of almost worked. Now there’s only one mouse roaming around. ** Brian O’Connell, Hi, Brian. Yeah, kind of mystical comedies crossed with hypnosis videos plus a bit of Stan Brakhage or something, I don’t know, ha ha. Congrats on the bonus week! I’m happy that ‘Funeral Rites’ sat so well with you. It’s my favourite Genet, as I previously mentioned. Mm, it might well have had an influence on my stuff, yes, that would make sense. I remember Propaganda, the magazine. I used to pick it up once in a while. I had friends were involved in it or modelled for it or something, I can’t quite remember. The test-shoot turned out to be just sitting around a table talking about camera angles and stuff, so it was grindstone-y. Soho Press, who’s publishing ‘I Wished’, wrote to tell me they’ve changed the cover of my novel because the marketing dept. didn’t like it, so now it has a completely different cover that I’m waiting for the go-ahead to upload here. Other than that, just some new film related stuff. What in the world will Friday saddle us with? Reportage? ** Okay. Here’s a quite old guest-post made for the blog years ago by the long lost d.l. Hyrule Dungeon about the films of the artist William Kentridge that I thought you or at least some of you might enjoy. See you tomorrow.
Now available in North America 
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WK is a very great multimedia artist. I remember Phaidon had one of their artists book series about him that my meagre student finances could never stretch to.
I streamed the new Poly Styrene doc the other night and it’s really good. A definite inspiration: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7206446/
Hey man,
That’s weird about the cover for ‘I wished’, I mean I think the one it has is cool as fuck. Here’s hoping the new one is as good. I wanted to ask if you’ve read ‘life for sale’ by Mishima? I just found out about it. This is the log line (?) from the novel: ‘Life for sale. Use me as you wish. I am a twenty-seven- year-old male. Discretion guaranteed. Will cause no bother at all.’’
Sounds interesting right? I thought I’d read all of Mishima and I had no idea about this. Y’know he was the first novelist I really got into which strikes me as both a little strange and fortunate now… though I had to work hard to exorcise his (translated style) from my own writing.
Dennis, Another blast from the past and yet another great one.
Ha! It was a woman who told me that re: hell. I like people’s different definitions or whatever about what hell is or will be. There was this Korean(?) girl who died and came back to life years ago and said that she was given a tour through hell…it was quite harrowing, very Dante-ish but different re: the tortures and all that. The oddest one to me, though not that odd when you think about it, is hell just being not able to get into heaven. Like, you’re just outside of it all the time and missing all the glory and all that.
Soooo…my mom does have a blood clot in that leg. The med she was prescribed was…wait for it…$527! What the fuck? She called her doc back, and he doc had 3 weeks of samples of a blood thinner in the same group, so I went and picked that up. Going forward, however, I guess I’m a have to plunk down that money for that. Ugh. The doc is talking about 6 months of this med.
There is only one generic blood thinner out there. Here’s the thing, though: the companies who produced the original sued and the courts ruled that they have the first rights to the generic…which they’ve never made available. FDA approved the generic in 2019, they sued, the judge ruled in their favor in 2020, and now they won’t produce the generic.
All blood thinners are around that price for a 30-day supply. My mom has Medicare A and B but not the prescription Part D. Ugh. What a fucking mess.
Yeah, taxes. Gotta do em. They’ll come after you eventually even though you’ve been living overseas for years and years. They catch up to you in the end. Fucked, yeah, but that’s the way things go.
Weirdly gorgeous stuff today’
Happy Birthday Sweet Baby James (my favorite recovered heroin addict)
The William Kentridge annimations are remarkable. Thanks for presenting them here. I don’t think I brought it up here yet, but I and my mom got the Johnson & Johnson one-shot vaccine, and I’m feeling pretty good about it. We’re not out of the dark woods yet, but I do see the light at the end of the road here. The only reaction I got and the same for my mother is that we were both sleepy the next day. No soreness, aches or fever. So, in two-weeks it will be safe for us to have a meal together with no masks on. Since we’re both Mexican food fans, I think I will order food-to-go and take it over to her home. Step-by-step it will get better. My daydreams right now is to travel to Japan and Paris.
Hi!!
I used to remember my dreams a lot more frequently than nowadays, but it happens to me too. The other day (I wanted to tell you about but then I forgot), I dreamt about one of my high school classmates with whom I probably exchanged six words over our four years in the same classroom (and those words were variations of “hi”). Anyway, in my dream, I visited him, and he was sitting in my huge beanbag, and he was only a head, literally just a head, and he told me he wasn’t sad because he could still roll over to his MP3 player (!) and start it by pushing it with his face. And then I woke up. So… here you go, haha. Do you remember any of your recent ones?
I think Sensitive Pornograph only has two episodes, but they’re beautifully drawn. Don’t expect a too intricate story, though, haha. Ah, seriously?! Are those mangas based on your novels available anywhere?
Okay. It’s literally impossible to compete with this love because it’s the best. The best love ever. Thank you! Love looking like the most gorgeous boy you’ve ever seen, but he turns into a bowl of perfect cold sesame noodles when you get bored of consuming him otherwise, Od.
Good to see this Kentridge day again. I’ve liked a lot of his work that I’ve seen, oddly enough, mostly in Germany.
Just started reading Johnny Stanton’s Mangled Hands. Quite a stream of surreal marvels so far.
Steve, that’s a nice article on Stanley Kwan’s Center Stage. I’ve never seen it, hope it’s streaming near me soon.
Bill
Dennis – Just emerging from the bathroom to tell you I like the scratchy fragility of these images. And thanx for the pipe-ream videos the day before. They and Misanthrope reminded me to schedule a procedure. Started reading Maggie Nelson’s monochromatic Bluets (Wave Books). Absorbing & fluid. Like a Napili Bay wave. Talk to you in 3, 2, 1…
@Bill–Thanks! Can you watch CENTER STAGE through the Metrograph’s website from California?
My super came over today and took pics of my closet to send to the landlord’s office. He did not seem happy with me, but I guess I have to wait to hear from the landlord.
I’ve started writing my review of the serpentwithfeet album. It’s very wholesome, to use a word I never expected to become a term of praise 20 years ago. (He says in the press release that he didn’t want to include any songs about heartbreak or negative emotions, and even “Same Size Shoe,” which is about his desire to only date Black men, never addresses racism.) There’s a communal feel that’s new to his music – he’s no longer just overdubbing layer upon layer of his own voice. It ends with Sampha singing the chorus of “Fellowship” along with him.
PS: I was just able to book an appointment for the COVID vaccine next Tuesday!
Hey, Dennis,
Like yesterday’s stuff, I find these animations rather chilling, ambiguously. A respectful nod to Hyrule Dungeon from across the Internet void. I applaud your oddly specific but eerily perfect description of the plumbing videos, well-done. That’s cool about your friends being involved in Propaganda. I posted about it today and a lot of people seemed to know it, have fond memories of it, etc. That was nice. I need to read about more gay mags of the past. Well, your test shoot does sound rather dry, but I guess that’s part of the process. Wow, I’m excited to see the cover, naturally. Do you like the new one better too? Friday didn’t saddle me with anything. Instead of doing the work I needed to I decided to just relax and put it off. I watched “Au Revoir les Enfants” by Louis Malle, which I thought was great. I was worried it was going to be super sentimentalized or treacly but instead it was really more restrained and subtle, so it had a powerful effect. I liked it a ton. I’m going to check out more of his movies. And that’s it for the day. This weekend I might finally start “2666”. And we’re seeing friends for “Princess Mononoke” as planned. That’s me. I hope yours is the most wonderful ever.
Thanks Dennis. Your blog was not working for me last night or most of today. But I will view it on my mobile phone, sometimes a tablet, and on a laptop.
I enjoyed Felix in Exile.
I have been a fan of the Zelda games since the late 1980s when I first played them on NES, I used to play the orignal game and the second game on NES emulators once a year. I have played other Zelda games through the decades. I don’t own a console and I just play card games and chess on a laptop. I am sure there are Zelda games as apps but I spend enough time as it is on the smart mobile phone reading websites, and answering email.
What Leary/Ram Dass/the McKenna brothers fail to realise about psychedelics is that they give people different experiences every single time, and are unpredictable. This is not a bad thing. I tend to value my experiences; but I have ‘been there, done that’ as they say.
Just wondering why are fisting and rimming so common in your novels? Do you practise them or did you? I am not into them and have no real desire to do them; but I have gay, bisexual, and even heterosexual friends who have done both. One gay friend of mine has done fisting as a top and loves to rim but he is very into anal sex and giving pleasure this way. I dated a gay man who wound up lying to me about how he had been fisted, and I did not like this so it was one reason why I ended things and stopped seeing him. I had asked him before casually if he had tried it and he said no; but then later he told me how he did try it, did not like it, and had no desire to do it again. I thought it was a super silly thing to have lied about. I will admit to sometimes being fascinated/amazed with fisting and watching gay/all male fisting porn, rare bisexual groupsex fisting porn from Prague, looking at lesbian fisting, and watching heterosexual vaginal fisting, and watching Trans porn with fisting. But it is out of amazement that people can somehow do this, or I guess concentrate enough to want to do this. I don’t see it as a ‘taboo’ the way some bisexual and gay men I have met do. When I first heard about rimming, I did think it was
Do you have the links or images of the Anime/magna that some woman made of your first three novels that you mentioned in the comments?
Have an excellent weekend. I will be watching both A Nightmare on Elm Street, and A Nightmare on Elm Street 2 with the fun leatherbar/bondage scenes. I remember seeing the 5th film first when I was rather young on VHS in a friend’s basement at his birthday party when everyone slept over and it was a lot more scary and gorey in my childhood memories than what the film was really like. I thought the shower scene should have been more bloody/scary.
….One more thing: Those pipe-ream videos are boring. (ba-DUM)