MoMA PRESENTS WILLIAM
KENTRIDGE: FIVE THEMES, A MAJOR SURVEY PREMIERING THE ARTIST'S MOST RECENT
WORK
Numerous Works Drawn from MoMA's Collection, with Many Works on
Display for the First Time in the U.S.
William
Kentridge: Five Themes
February 24-May 17, 2010
Contemporary
Galleries, second floor
Press Preview: Tuesday, February 23, 10:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. RSVP (212) 708-9401 or pressoffice@moma.org
NEW YORK, February 10,
2010—The
Museum of Modern Art presents William Kentridge: Five Themes, a
comprehensive survey of the artist's career, featuring more than 100 works in a
range of mediums—animated films, drawings, prints, theater models, and books—on
view from February 24 to May 17, 2010. Kentridge (South African, b. 1955) has
earned international acclaim for his interdisciplinary practice, which mingles the
fields of visual art, film, and theater. Known for engaging with the social and
political landscape of his homeland, South Africa, he has produced a body of
work that explores colonial oppression and social conflict, loss and
reconciliation, and the ephemeral nature of both personal and cultural memory. The
exhibition underscores the interrelatedness of his mediums and disciplines
through the presentation of five primary themes that cut across Kentridge's artistic
output. William Kentridge: Five Themes,
which follows a chronological progression, comprises works created over the
last three decades and features new developments, revealing as never before the
full arc of his distinguished career.
The
exhibition also traces the evolution of Kentridge's subject matter,
from the specific context of apartheid in South Africa to more universal
stories and a range of human conditions. In recent years Kentridge's thematic
concerns have expanded to include his own studio practice, the Enlightenment
and colonialism, and the cultural history of post-revolutionary Russia. This
newer work is based on an intensive exploration of themes connected to Kentridge's
own life experience, as well as the social issues that most concern him. Compared
to his earlier work, the new projects are dramatically larger in scope, such as
The Nose—a full-scale opera directed
and designed by Kentridge, which makes its world premiere at The Metropolitan
Opera in March 2010.
William Kentridge: Five Themes
was organized by independent curator Mark Rosenthal, in close collaboration
with the artist, for the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Norton
Museum of Art in Florida, two of the venues which presented the exhibition in
2009. It will travel internationally to museums in Paris, Vienna, Jerusalem,
Amsterdam, and Vancouver. At MoMA, the exhibition has been expanded, with approximately
half of the New York presentation drawn from MoMA's unparalleled collection of
Kentridge's installations, films, drawings, and prints, several of which were
included in the travelling exhibition. An additional 30 prints from the
Museum's collection have also been included in MoMA's presentation. The exhibition
is organized at MoMA by Klaus Biesenbach, MoMA's Chief Curator-at-Large, and Director
of P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center; Judith B. Hecker, Assistant Curator,
Department of Prints and Illustrated Books; and Cara Starke, Assistant Curator,
Department of Media and Performance Art.
