The first word that comes to mind to describe “In Praise of Shadows“ is ‘immense’. This may be what is expected from an artist’s thirty-year retrospective, but William Kentridge is not just any artist. The South African artist is prolific, and this show captures the serious, playful, productive and inquisitive nature of the artist.

William Kentridge, drawing for the film “Other Faces,” 2011. Courtesy of The Broad Art Foundation, Los Angeles.

The walls of the lower gallery at the Broad are brimming with charcoal drawings and prints. Each piece masterfully executed in the proficient and expressive drawing style that Kentridge is best known for. The content of the work centers around his experience living in South Africa during and after apartheid. There are also references to his connection with theatre troupes and interest in early cinema.

Excitingly, the exhibition includes all eleven of his series Drawings for Projection (1989-2020), which are on view in a makeshift cinema-like viewing. These animated drawings are created by adding and erasing charcoal onto a single drawing surface to create the illusion of motion and to tell a narrative. The main character of the films is a fictitious man named Soho Eckstein who is a mining magnate working and living in-and-around Johannesburg. There are a couple rows of old cinema chairs to sit on while watching the films play back-to-back. If you were to watch all these films in one sitting it would take approximately an hour and a half, so make sure to allocate a fair amount of time for this exhibition!

“William Kentridge: In Praise of Shadows” exhibition. Artwork: “Other Faces,” 2011. Courtesy of The Broad Art Foundation, Los Angeles. © William Kentridge.

There are many other notable parts of the exhibition. For example, on display are his lesser-known series of bronzes, like Procession (1999-2000) or Cursive (2020). Apart from the vast number of drawings, prints, bronzes and contraptions on display, there are also multiple gallery rooms turned into elaborate installations such as Kentridge’s five-channel video installation called The refusal of Time (2012) and 7 Fragments for Melies, Journey to the Moon, Day for Night (2003). Needless to say, Kentridge is an artist’s artist. Anyone who gets a thrill from seeing the convergence of high craft and thoughtful, conceptual engagement should do themselves the favor of seeing this immense show.

William Kentridge: In Praise of Shadows
The Broad
On view through April 9, 2023