William Kentridge Exhibition at the Royal Academy

In September 2022 I went to a retrospective exhibition of the South African artist William Kentridge. The bold and unapologetic way in which Kentridge works is fascinating to me and my hope was that by seeing some of his work first hand it would help me understand his process better. One thing that really chimed when reading and looking at the exhibition was the process he has of allowing ideas to 'collide and overlap. There doesn't seem to be a clear linear path through his colection - but at not point does that feel problematic. In fact, the rich layers of his pieces are what make them so dynamic and compelling. I love the way Kentridge takes themes (and in his case, mostly the issues surrounding and social impact of apartheid in South Africa) and then matches these ideas with materials (mostly charcoal). Kentridge talks himself about how working in this way allows an idea to become another idea and that 'thinking in material' helps an idea to evolve. In my tutorial yesterday we discussed how a piece of art work created has one job – that of to teach me how to create the next piece of work. I like this idea of self propelling or perpetuating creativity and want to use this more consciously going forward.

Here are some photos from the exhibition:

Since seeing the exhibition I have been reading a bit more about Kentridge, and found a TED talk titled The Creative Process of a Master Artist particularly informative. Here, Kentridge talks about the importance of a studio space (whatever that may be) and protecting this place for mistakes to happen being critical. He talks about how ideas from the outside world get met by things that are already in us - so the final meaning (eg a drawing) is always a negotiation between what comes towards us in the world and how we project that image (ie through making a drawing). This makes me think of the themes I'm interested in at the moment and how I can push them further using what I know about Kentridge's process. I am influenced largely by the female experience through history, portrayed or documented in literature. I'm questioning to what extent women still experience life in the way they did, say 100 years ago. I'm interested in the dichotomy of the feminine - the 'divine and demonic' (to quote the exhibition of the same name I went to at the British Museum). If I meet these ideas with materials that are inherently expressive (watercolour, charcoal and the layering of these) what ideas will evolve further?

Although I recognise there's similarities with how I work and way Kentridge does (process led, evolving organically through ideas, allowing for tangents) I am aware that I'm not as bold as he is! I mentioned having boldness as an aim in my tutorial and so I decided to put some of this boldness exuded by Kentridge into practice. You can see the first results of this in my next blog - and I expect to be re visiting this way of working in the months ahead.