Artist Talk: The Head & the Load

CONVERSATION SERIES: INTERROGATIONS OF FORM ARTIST TALK: THE HEAD & THE LOAD Thursday, December 6, 2018 at 6:30pm Board of Officers Room Thompson Arts Center at Park Avenue Armory Featuring:

William Kentridge Philip Miller Thuthuka Sibisi Moderated by Augustus Casely-Hayford

SEASON SPONSORS

PRODUCTION SPONSORS

The Head & The Load is supported in part by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Jennifer and Jonathan Allan Soros, Daniel Clay Houghton, Sarah Billinghurst and the Howard and Sarah Solomon Foundation, Betsy and Edward Cohen, Art Dealers Association of America, and the Francis Goelet Charitable Lead Trusts. The production is also supported in part by public funds from the National Endowment for the Arts, and by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the city council.

Support for Park Avenue Armory’s artistic season has been generously provided by the Charina Endowment Fund, the Altman Foundation, The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust, the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, the Howard Gilman Foundation, the Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, The Emma and Georgina Bloomberg Foundation, the Marc Haas Foundation, The Kaplen Brothers Fund, the Juliet Lea Hillman Simonds Foundation, the Leon Levy Foundation, the May and Samuel Rudin Family Foundation, the Richenthal Foundation, and the Isak and Rose Weinman Foundation. Additional support has been provided by the Armory’s Artistic Council.

Cover image: Stella Olivier

MEET THE PARTICIPANTS WILLIAM KENTRIDGE THUTHUKA SIBISI William Kentridge (born Johannesburg, South Africa, 1955) Thuthuka Sibisi’s background includes studies of music, is internationally acclaimed for his drawings, films, theater, and opera productions. His work responds to the legacies of colonialism and apartheid, within the context of South Africa’s socio-political landscape. His aesthetics are drawn from the medium of film’s own history, from stop-motion animation to early special effects. Kentridge’s drawing, specifically the dynamism of an erased and redrawn mark, is an integral part of his expanded animation and filmmaking practice, where the meanings of his films are developed during the process of their making. His work has been seen in museums, galleries, festivals, and opera houses worldwide since the 1990s. His recent work includes his ambitious yet ephemeral public art project for Rome, Triumphs and Laments—a 500m frieze figure powerwashed from pollution and bacterial growth on the walls of the Tiber River—which opened in April 2016 with a performance of live music composed by Philip Miller and a procession of shadow figures.

physical theater, and movement. He served as Musical Director for several of Philip Miller’s projects, including the opera Between A Rock and A Hard Place in collaboration with Cape Town Opera and Miller’s Pulling Numbers. He also served as Musical Director for Ciné-Concert, presented as part of Notes Toward a Model Opera by William Kentridge. In 2016, Sibisi made his Italian debut as Music Director for Kentridge’s Triumphs and Laments. He was Associate Conductor and Chorus Master for Bongani Ndonana-Breen’s oratoria Credo, written to commemorate UNISA’s 140th anniversary of its founding. Additional projects include a commission by Cape Town Opera for Musiquées Sacrée d’Afrique et d’Europe, in residence at Festival International d’Aix-en-Provence (France).

Visual collaborations include Extracts from The Underground (2013), a reiteration of the short opera Between A Rock and A Hard Place as a live-art installation, and The African Choir 1891 Re-imagined (2016), a new sound/image installation created with Miller.

PHILIP MILLER Philip Miller is a composer and sound artist based in Cape Town, AUGUSTUS CASELY-HAYFORD South Africa. He has worked with his longtime collaborator Dr. Casely-Hayford is the Director of the Smithsonian, William Kentridge since 1994. His music has recently been heard in London with the installation, Refusal of Time (Whitechapel) the cine-concert, Paper Music (Print Room), and Five Themes (Tate Modern, The Tanks). In 2016, he composed Triumphs and Laments with Thuthuka Sibisi, a processional march for two orchestras and choir that was performed in front of Kentridge’s frieze in Rome. Miller’s independent projects include his award-winning Rewind: A Cantata for Voice, Tape & Testimony, presented at the Market Theatre (South Africa), The 62 Centre, Williams College, Celebrate Brooklyn, and the Royal Festival Hall (2011). In 2013, the work was selected for the South African Pavilion at the Venice Biennale. His most recent collaboration with Thuthuka Sibisi is the sound installation The African Choir of 1891 Re-imagined, at Autograph ABP (London), the Apartheid Museum, and National Gallery (South Africa).

National Museum of African Art. Across an evolving career, he has played a number of roles in the Arts. He is perhaps best known as the presenter for Tate Britain’s Great British Walks, a six-part television series for Sky Arts, and two series of Lost Kingdoms of Africa for the BBC. He has published widely and has offered leadership to a range of institutions. During his career he has been the Director of Iniva, the Executive Director of Arts Strategy for Arts Council, England and has served on the board of a variety national museums. This year his contribution to the arts was acknowledged by the Queen when he received an OBE.

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