Things to do in Cape Town

The largest exhibition to be held in Africa in over a decade by internationally acclaimed artist William Kentridge is set to open in Cape Town in August this year. The major exhibition of his work will be hosted simultaneously in two parts by these well–known institutions Norval Foundation and the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa (Zeitz MOCAA), opening 24 August and running through to March 2020.

This will be the first exhibition internationally to address Kentridge’s output as a sculptor. Covering several bodies of work, and testifying to his longstanding and spontaneous improvisation when handling three-dimensional form.

Norval Foundation is presenting, for the first time, an exhibition focused solely on William Kentridge’s sculptural practice, working in conjunction with the artist and his studio. Kentridge’s sculptures embrace a spontaneous approach and have recently evolved towards the massive and the monumental.

The Norval Foundation institution is proud to be hosting Why Should I Hesitate? Sculpture. A key aspect of the Foundation is our commitment to exhibiting the sculptural and installation-based practices of a variety of artists, which is facilitated by our purpose-designed building.

In particular, we invite artists and curators to respond to gallery eight, our largest gallery, with William Kentridge’s exhibition exemplifying this. The gallery has reinforced floors to support works that weigh as much as eight tons, and reach as high as nine meters. The monumental size of this gallery sits in an ideal contrast to the anti-monumental, spontaneous and theatrical sculptures that form part of this exhibition.

Why Should I Hesitate? Putting Drawings to Work will be staged at Zeitz MOCAA and will offer a wide survey of Kentridge’s work, including early works, as well as newer pieces on view for the first time in South Africa. It will cover over 40 years of artistic production (1976 -2019) in drawing, stop-frame animation, video, prints, sculpture, tapestry, video, and large-scale installation.

This large scale survey exhibition prompts us to consider how various artistic media, initiated from two-dimensional works on paper, can be seeds through which Kentridge has developed his concerns for history, particularly in relation to his home continent, Africa and its historical ties further afield.

The exhibitions will also be accompanied by a series of talks and performances with the artist, and leading voices in the cultural sector.