Art that Has Meaning

Is the image of a table a table? For versatile contemporary artist William Kentridge, a table can also be seen as a phase in the existence of a tree. Or even, going further back, as the result of the transformation of a seed, or further on, as something that will end up as ashes. In his famous series of animation films Drawings for Projection (1989 – 2020), a single charcoal drawing is altered and transformed by tracing and erasing, evoking the idea of ​​a continuous present, and shadows, a recurring element in his work, remind us that everything is in a permanent state of change and we cannot trust to certainties.

In Kentridge’s work, images resist being fixed as hard-and-fast meanings. Using drawing, sculpture, theatre and animation, his artistic projects invite us to explore doubt and ambiguity, and highlight the dangers of certainties. And this is not just a declaration of principles: it is also, most importantly, a way of being. For the artist, creation and thinking go hand in hand, and artistic practice becomes an open process that seeks to understand the world by means of trial and error.

The session will have a pedagogical dossier (in Catalan) so that the students can work on the contents beforehand in the classroom and thus make the most out of the lecture.