Born in 1955 in Johannesburg, William Kentridge attended the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg and the Johannesburg Art Foundation, but he also studied mime and theater at the L’École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq in Paris. He lives and works in Johannesburg.
Kentridge works in various mediums but is best known for his short, lyrical animated films, which show charcoal drawings in various states of composition and erasure. He often draws on personal experience in constructing narratives of life under apartheid.
Kentridge has been the subject of numerous exhibitions in some of the most important museums, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the Castello di Rivoli, Turin, the Deutche Guggenheim in Berlin and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. His work has also been exhibited in major international shows such as Documenta 11 (2002) and Documenta 10 (1997), and the Venice Biennale in 2005, 1999, and 1993.
WILLIAM KENTRIDGE
