0:00:17 > 0:00:19Yeah!
0:00:21 > 0:00:23Yeah. Yeah.
0:00:24 > 0:00:25Yeah.
0:00:25 > 0:00:28CHOIR SINGS SLOWLY
0:00:28 > 0:00:30Come with me here.
0:00:44 > 0:00:47I hadn't thought of these as being kind of being utopian machines,
0:00:47 > 0:00:49machines of failed utopia.
0:00:49 > 0:00:51They should have changed the world, but really don't.
0:00:51 > 0:00:54PLAINTIVE SINGING
0:01:07 > 0:01:09Sometimes you come across an artist
0:01:09 > 0:01:12whose work you're completely unprepared for.
0:01:12 > 0:01:16William Kentridge amazed me from the start.
0:01:18 > 0:01:22He was born in South Africa shortly after the imposition of apartheid.
0:01:22 > 0:01:26His career has coincided with the most turbulent period
0:01:26 > 0:01:28in his country's history.
0:01:31 > 0:01:34HIGH-PITCHED CHANTING
0:01:48 > 0:01:52I met Kentridge in Rome where he was working on an installation
0:01:52 > 0:01:57to celebrate the founding of the city, called Triumphs And Laments,
0:01:57 > 0:02:00for which he's created a massive frieze
0:02:00 > 0:02:04that stretches for half a kilometre along the banks of the River Tiber.
0:02:05 > 0:02:08The opening performance included two orchestras,
0:02:08 > 0:02:10two choirs and 200 volunteers.
0:02:10 > 0:02:14LOUD CACOPHONY OF MUSIC
0:02:17 > 0:02:19Like William himself,
0:02:19 > 0:02:22it was both profound and playful at the same time.
0:02:22 > 0:02:25He may be dedicated to his art,
0:02:25 > 0:02:28but he never takes himself too seriously.
0:02:46 > 0:02:50Can you describe your life as an artist?
0:02:52 > 0:02:56Can you rather say, what it was that you did today, to give us some sense
0:02:56 > 0:03:02of how you fill your hours between waking and sleeping every day?
0:03:02 > 0:03:05Can you tell us about what inspires you...
0:03:05 > 0:03:09If there was enough time, I would be able to do so many different things
0:03:09 > 0:03:12that one could begin to spin out for everyone here.
0:03:12 > 0:03:14But there's such a shortage, hard to explain...
0:03:15 > 0:03:19He's not saying anything that's interesting at all.
0:03:19 > 0:03:23I mean, he's not talking about truth or truth and beauty.
0:03:23 > 0:03:26What makes you tick?
0:03:29 > 0:03:31JOYFUL SINGING
0:03:40 > 0:03:43In Rome, William took me to his studio to show me
0:03:43 > 0:03:46the drawings he'd done for the giant frieze along the Tiber.
0:03:49 > 0:03:53- Quite a space.- It is. It's a kind of....
0:03:53 > 0:03:57All light, it has a beautiful clear light in it.
0:03:57 > 0:04:00One feels... I feel I should be doing drawings
0:04:00 > 0:04:02nine meters high like the ones on the river.
0:04:04 > 0:04:06And then these are just the...
0:04:06 > 0:04:10miniature versions of the stencils that we used
0:04:10 > 0:04:12to actually wash the figures out.
0:04:13 > 0:04:15Is this the sequence?
0:04:15 > 0:04:17No, that's a section of them.
0:04:17 > 0:04:19That's a collection, they're not...
0:04:19 > 0:04:21Here there are, two, four, six...ten of them.
0:04:21 > 0:04:24And there are 52 on the wall.
0:04:24 > 0:04:27So, if you extended this five times around,
0:04:27 > 0:04:29that would get the proportion.
0:04:29 > 0:04:34These are all drawings for shadows that people will carry
0:04:34 > 0:04:35in the procession.
0:04:35 > 0:04:37At the opening we have two bands -
0:04:37 > 0:04:40a band playing triumphs and a band playing laments.
0:04:40 > 0:04:44They start at opposite ends and they kind of come together
0:04:44 > 0:04:47and have this chaos of the interaction,
0:04:47 > 0:04:49and then pass through each other.
0:04:51 > 0:04:54SLOW GENTLE SINGING
0:05:08 > 0:05:12The title, Triumphs and Laments, refers to the darker side
0:05:12 > 0:05:15of the city's history as well as to its achievements.
0:05:17 > 0:05:20Triumphs and Laments is my theme.
0:05:20 > 0:05:23It came from a sudden realisation
0:05:23 > 0:05:26that in art school one had learned about the glories
0:05:26 > 0:05:29of the Italian Renaissance, St Peter's,
0:05:29 > 0:05:33Michelangelo's design, architecture and painting.
0:05:33 > 0:05:36And later, I understood about the ghetto in Rome.
0:05:36 > 0:05:39- The Jewish ghetto. - The Jewish ghetto.
0:05:39 > 0:05:42And I'd always assumed that that in fact was a medieval project.
0:05:43 > 0:05:47And so the shock was discovering, no, it's a project of modernity.
0:05:47 > 0:05:49The ghetto's established in 1570,
0:05:49 > 0:05:53the same time they're building St Peter's Cathedral.
0:05:53 > 0:05:56This heroic history of Rome and the shameful history of Rome
0:05:56 > 0:05:58came together.
0:05:58 > 0:06:02So, it's that imbrication of triumphant and lamentable moments
0:06:02 > 0:06:04that becomes the theme.
0:06:04 > 0:06:07And you could say that's the theme of life anyway.
0:06:07 > 0:06:10For every success, or for every win, there's a loss.
0:06:10 > 0:06:13I mean, coming from South Africa, it's obviously
0:06:13 > 0:06:17a sense of understanding histories as shameful, not just heroic.
0:06:18 > 0:06:23And this sense of the colonial history, of Africa's relationship
0:06:23 > 0:06:25with Europe, all of that is also, I imagine...
0:06:25 > 0:06:28It is, because particularly in Europe now,
0:06:28 > 0:06:32you have a sense that these migrants are seen as coming from nowhere,
0:06:32 > 0:06:36- from outside of history into a pure Europe.- Yes.
0:06:36 > 0:06:39And the historical memory of Europe's hunger for the world
0:06:39 > 0:06:43outside of Europe - in Africa, in the Middle East, in Asia,
0:06:43 > 0:06:48in South America - which was happy for hundreds of years to say,
0:06:48 > 0:06:51we will turn ourselves into this astonishingly wealthy,
0:06:51 > 0:06:53tiny section of the world.
0:06:53 > 0:06:56But as soon as the people in the area from which you've taken
0:06:56 > 0:06:59have come knocking at our door, we lock the gates.
0:07:04 > 0:07:07What is the background here? The backdrop, if you like?
0:07:07 > 0:07:11There's something much nicer about drawing on this paper
0:07:11 > 0:07:13- than on this paper.- Mmm.
0:07:13 > 0:07:16- So, are you always on the lookout for...- I am.
0:07:16 > 0:07:19I mean, here are the books that I found here.
0:07:24 > 0:07:28So, this is a Latin-Italian dictionary from 1814.
0:07:29 > 0:07:33- Which has this very good tooth for charcoal.- This is so funny.
0:07:33 > 0:07:35The idea that there's this beautiful book
0:07:35 > 0:07:37- and you're looking at the texture of it...- It is.
0:07:37 > 0:07:40It's very odd to go into a bookshop and they say,
0:07:40 > 0:07:41"What book are you looking for?"
0:07:41 > 0:07:43I say, "I'm looking for a book about this fat."
0:07:43 > 0:07:47And they say, "About what subject?" And I say, "Not important."
0:07:47 > 0:07:50- It's what age it is. - Age and the quality of the paper.
0:07:50 > 0:07:52But this is quite a good...
0:07:52 > 0:07:55I mean, 1750 is a much nicer paper than 1814.
0:07:55 > 0:07:58- I'm actually feeling this texture. - The texture is good.
0:08:02 > 0:08:05# This frag-fragile me
0:08:05 > 0:08:07# Under, under, under the stars
0:08:07 > 0:08:10# Be, be je-jeal-jealous
0:08:10 > 0:08:14# You plucked, plucked plucked beside and then... #
0:08:16 > 0:08:20William gives these old books a new life by transforming them
0:08:20 > 0:08:23into his touching and surprising short films.
0:08:25 > 0:08:27And this one...
0:08:27 > 0:08:29This is a geographical dictionary.
0:08:32 > 0:08:35Quite a good... Where's the eraser?
0:08:36 > 0:08:38That's quite a good tough paper.
0:08:38 > 0:08:40Rub this into grey.
0:08:41 > 0:08:44Leaves quite a strong grey. The text, in fact, rubs off.
0:08:44 > 0:08:48Yes, I see that. The text's rubbing off.
0:08:48 > 0:08:51In Johannesburg, it's very hard to find beautiful books like that.
0:08:51 > 0:08:53I've been through all the second-hand bookshops
0:08:53 > 0:08:57and raided them. Some of them I just take home to Johannesburg.
0:08:57 > 0:09:01# Is this fra-fra-fra fragile me, me, me
0:09:01 > 0:09:04# Under the stars, under the stars under the stars
0:09:04 > 0:09:07# Be jealous. #
0:09:19 > 0:09:23William Kentridge is the product of another city
0:09:23 > 0:09:26with a triumphant and lamentable history of its own.
0:09:26 > 0:09:29He grew up in Johannesburg during the apartheid era
0:09:29 > 0:09:33when South Africans were separated according to their race.
0:09:40 > 0:09:44- TV COMMENTARY:- Parts of Johannesburg are so modern they're almost like
0:09:44 > 0:09:46an American skyscraper town.
0:09:46 > 0:09:5080 years ago, before the gold, there was nothing here at all.
0:09:50 > 0:09:53Now there is a rich town - sunlit, wide and spacious.
0:09:53 > 0:09:56But always at the back of their minds, Europeans have a fear
0:09:56 > 0:10:00that non-Europeans will somehow crowd them out of it.
0:10:19 > 0:10:24In 1989, William made the first of a series of hand-drawn
0:10:24 > 0:10:28animated films that he calls Drawings For Projection.
0:10:30 > 0:10:32Set in Johannesburg,
0:10:32 > 0:10:35they're both highly personal and unsettlingly universal.
0:10:38 > 0:10:42"Johannesburg, the 2nd greatest city after Paris" was the first film.
0:10:42 > 0:10:47And when it was made in 1989 there was no understanding at all
0:10:47 > 0:10:52that it will become part of a series that would be going on for 26 years.
0:10:54 > 0:10:56And ongoing.
0:10:56 > 0:10:59The title came from this absurd dream phrase -
0:10:59 > 0:11:02at that stage I was keeping a dream diary, and I woke up
0:11:02 > 0:11:06with an image of a group photograph and the caption said,
0:11:06 > 0:11:09"Soho Eckstein," don't know where the name came from,
0:11:09 > 0:11:13"with 120 artists and photographers who've spent eight hours
0:11:13 > 0:11:17"recording Johannesburg, the 2nd greatest city after Paris."
0:11:29 > 0:11:33The central character is a ruthless industrialist called Soho Eckstein
0:11:33 > 0:11:38who buys up most of the city and builds a huge business empire.
0:11:46 > 0:11:48Felix Teitlebaum is a romantic artist
0:11:48 > 0:11:51who is based on Kentridge himself.
0:11:53 > 0:11:56Felix, needing to be another character by default,
0:11:56 > 0:11:58became me looking in the mirror.
0:11:58 > 0:12:00If I'd known I was going to be stuck with this character for the next
0:12:00 > 0:12:0420 years I may well have just let me use some other person.
0:12:04 > 0:12:06And then I thought, we've got these two characters,
0:12:06 > 0:12:08Felix and Soho, how do we make a connection?
0:12:08 > 0:12:12So the connection was made by putting Mrs Eckstein,
0:12:12 > 0:12:14Soho's wife, between the two.
0:12:20 > 0:12:24- There are scenes of sexual activity going on.- There are scenes.
0:12:24 > 0:12:28When the film was shown at a film festival in Johannesburg
0:12:28 > 0:12:32in the late '80s, it had to go to the Publications Control Board,
0:12:32 > 0:12:34as the Censorship Board was known at the time.
0:12:34 > 0:12:37It came back with a report saying,
0:12:37 > 0:12:40"The film contained scenes of intercourse and fellatio,
0:12:40 > 0:12:44"however, they are sufficiently badly drawn not to give offence."
0:12:44 > 0:12:47And they were allowed to remain.
0:13:38 > 0:13:41William's grandparents came to South Africa from Lithuania,
0:13:41 > 0:13:45part of a wave of Jewish immigrants fleeing persecution in Europe
0:13:45 > 0:13:48before the First World War.
0:13:49 > 0:13:51They quickly became successful and were able to move
0:13:51 > 0:13:55to the comfortable northern suburbs of Johannesburg.
0:14:06 > 0:14:09William still lives here and works in the studio he's built
0:14:09 > 0:14:12in the garden of the house he grew up in as a child.
0:14:28 > 0:14:30This is the book that I bought in Rome.
0:14:30 > 0:14:35This 1814 Latin-Italian dictionary.
0:14:37 > 0:14:39Which I'm dismembering and drawing in.
0:14:39 > 0:14:42It's, in a way, almost a list of things that I've drawn before.
0:14:42 > 0:14:45So the Eurasian tree sparrow from a project
0:14:45 > 0:14:48about the Cultural Revolution, Madame Mao also.
0:14:49 > 0:14:52Bismarck, just as a historical figure because I came across
0:14:52 > 0:14:57this remarkable photograph of Bismarck taken just after he died.
0:15:03 > 0:15:05SPLASHING
0:15:10 > 0:15:14Drawn in charcoal with the occasional use of colour,
0:15:14 > 0:15:19William's lyrical films are almost ostentatiously handmade.
0:15:20 > 0:15:23The result of a laborious frame-by-frame process
0:15:23 > 0:15:26that he calls Stone Age film-making.
0:15:31 > 0:15:34How did you discover this... what you call Stone Age film-making?
0:15:34 > 0:15:35Stone Age film-making.
0:15:35 > 0:15:39It started, I suppose, because I was already making charcoal drawings
0:15:39 > 0:15:41and I thought, what would it be if one filmed the process
0:15:41 > 0:15:43of making a drawing?
0:15:43 > 0:15:46So, I start with a blank sheet of paper and under the camera,
0:15:46 > 0:15:49frame by frame, you see the drawing constructing itself.
0:15:49 > 0:15:52It was a record of a drawing making itself.
0:15:52 > 0:15:54But then I realised if once the drawing was made
0:15:54 > 0:15:57you continued the drawing, and erasing, and drawing, erasing,
0:15:57 > 0:16:00and filmed it, the drawing could have a narrative and a life
0:16:00 > 0:16:02beyond simply its construction.
0:16:05 > 0:16:09But what is remarkable about these animations of yours is
0:16:09 > 0:16:13they do feel the kind of human... They feel...
0:16:13 > 0:16:16They're certainly not made by a machine, this kind of...
0:16:16 > 0:16:18You would be hard-pressed to get a machine to do it
0:16:18 > 0:16:20as roughly or as badly.
0:16:20 > 0:16:23If you're drawing for an animation, the image is there
0:16:23 > 0:16:27for a 25th or a 12th of a second and then if it changes,
0:16:27 > 0:16:29even if it's going wrong, it's fine, you can rescue it.
0:16:29 > 0:16:31It's constantly there to be rescued.
0:16:34 > 0:16:38So, I'll do a test filming today to see if it's working in principle.
0:16:39 > 0:16:42It depends how long each sequence takes but it can be an ongoing thing
0:16:42 > 0:16:44until I run out of pages.
0:16:46 > 0:16:48So, it will be like a dictionary.
0:16:48 > 0:16:50A soft dictionary.
0:16:52 > 0:16:54PLAYFUL MUSIC
0:16:57 > 0:16:59This is really testing this paper,
0:16:59 > 0:17:03this kind of rhythm of dust and cloud.
0:17:04 > 0:17:08And then there's different pieces of music.
0:17:08 > 0:17:10It's nice to try things that feel completely wrong.
0:17:10 > 0:17:12See what they do.
0:17:18 > 0:17:21This is Brazilian music described as music for lift girls
0:17:21 > 0:17:23and taxi drivers.
0:17:23 > 0:17:24ALAN CHUCKLES
0:17:27 > 0:17:29Turns into much more of a dance.
0:17:31 > 0:17:33HIGH-TEMPO BRAZILIAN MUSIC
0:17:49 > 0:17:51You were brought up in this house
0:17:51 > 0:17:54and you've been living in it since when?
0:17:54 > 0:17:56Well, I lived in the house from when I was nine
0:17:56 > 0:17:58through when I left at 21.
0:17:59 > 0:18:02And then I came back when my parents emigrated to London,
0:18:02 > 0:18:04back to England.
0:18:04 > 0:18:06I had a family and children.
0:18:06 > 0:18:09We moved in here 20 years ago.
0:18:20 > 0:18:25William's home movies show an idyllic, privileged childhood,
0:18:25 > 0:18:29full of sunshine, picnics and seaside holidays.
0:18:29 > 0:18:31A world which he's also drawn on in his films.
0:18:46 > 0:18:51The Tide Table, I'd had an idea of Soho on the beach.
0:18:51 > 0:18:53The idea of the deckchair,
0:18:53 > 0:18:56the man in his three-piece suit, was key to it.
0:18:56 > 0:18:59- Your grandfather. - My grandfather.
0:18:59 > 0:19:01In the photograph my father is an eight-year-old child
0:19:01 > 0:19:03sitting next to him on the sand.
0:19:03 > 0:19:05So you have my grandfather and my father.
0:19:07 > 0:19:11In the film, that shifts because we have Soho in the deckchair
0:19:11 > 0:19:14and that is based on photographs I took of myself in the deckchair.
0:19:18 > 0:19:21And my eight-year-old son Sam became the model for
0:19:21 > 0:19:23the child in the film.
0:19:23 > 0:19:27So you had in a way four generations,
0:19:27 > 0:19:30as about our relationship to our younger selves.
0:19:35 > 0:19:39That's an image very much of my old nanny and myself on the beach.
0:19:39 > 0:19:41Of course in my childhood, until 1990s,
0:19:41 > 0:19:43beaches were segregated.
0:19:43 > 0:19:46There were white beaches and there were a few dangerous
0:19:46 > 0:19:49small beaches for black people. So nannies could look after
0:19:49 > 0:19:52- the white children on the beach, but...- They were allowed to do that.
0:19:52 > 0:19:55- But not to go into the sea.- Right. - Not beyond their ankles.
0:20:16 > 0:20:19And this is your inscription. 7th of August 1930.
0:20:19 > 0:20:22It's my mum's years. It's a memorial for my mother.
0:20:22 > 0:20:24- Oh, it's a memorial for your mother. - Yeah.
0:20:26 > 0:20:30- June 2015.- 1930 to last year. - Felicia.- Yeah.
0:20:35 > 0:20:37INDISTINCT
0:20:39 > 0:20:42Is this an area where Soho Eckstein
0:20:42 > 0:20:45- and the wealthy plutocrats would have lived?- It is.
0:20:45 > 0:20:49It was from the 1920s, it was one of the desirable suburbs.
0:20:49 > 0:20:52I was born a few kilometres away
0:20:52 > 0:20:56and I went to school just on the other side of the hill
0:20:56 > 0:20:58and to university 3km this way.
0:20:58 > 0:21:01So this area and the area closer to the city
0:21:01 > 0:21:04has been my terrain for the last 60 years.
0:21:06 > 0:21:08Was it an exclusively white area?
0:21:08 > 0:21:10Well, everything outside the townships was designated
0:21:10 > 0:21:12as a white area.
0:21:12 > 0:21:16But there were always servants who lived in the back-yards of houses.
0:21:16 > 0:21:19- It was not...- They were allowed to live here, were they?
0:21:19 > 0:21:21They were allowed to live in the back-yards of houses
0:21:21 > 0:21:22if they were servants.
0:21:22 > 0:21:25Otherwise they would either have to live in the townships
0:21:25 > 0:21:28or if they didn't have a stamp in their pass book
0:21:28 > 0:21:29they would be, as it was called,
0:21:29 > 0:21:32endorsed out, sent back to the rural areas.
0:21:32 > 0:21:35So it was assumed that the rural areas would be like holding areas
0:21:35 > 0:21:39for a working population that would come into the city when needed
0:21:39 > 0:21:42and be sent back out of the city when not needed.
0:21:42 > 0:21:48You had this extraordinary contrast between these leafy suburbs
0:21:48 > 0:21:51of both irrigation and privilege
0:21:51 > 0:21:54and then the much more bleak areas just outside.
0:22:07 > 0:22:11William's parents were both committed opponents of apartheid.
0:22:12 > 0:22:17His mother Felicia helped set up the Legal Resources Centre
0:22:17 > 0:22:20which gave advice and support to victims of the regime.
0:22:24 > 0:22:27His father Sydney was one of the country's leading barristers
0:22:27 > 0:22:32who successfully defended many of South Africa's black nationalists,
0:22:32 > 0:22:33including Nelson Mandela.
0:22:38 > 0:22:42As always even in an abnormal situation, if that's what you're
0:22:42 > 0:22:45living in, it feels like the default natural circumstance.
0:22:45 > 0:22:49It didn't feel odd when I was at an all-white school
0:22:49 > 0:22:53that swimming pools or cinemas were for white people only.
0:22:53 > 0:22:58It took a while to understand the unnaturalness of it.
0:22:58 > 0:23:00I think for me it was earlier
0:23:00 > 0:23:02because of my parents' connection to law
0:23:02 > 0:23:05and through law to politics and so forth.
0:23:05 > 0:23:08- And human rights.- And human rights and people that came.
0:23:08 > 0:23:12And I suppose it was really through my mother's rage
0:23:12 > 0:23:17and ongoing undying rage against what was happening here.
0:23:17 > 0:23:19And then through the cases that my father,
0:23:19 > 0:23:23as a lawyer, very involved with different political trials.
0:23:23 > 0:23:24What did you study?
0:23:26 > 0:23:31I did a BA, bachelor of arts in politics and African history.
0:23:31 > 0:23:35And at the same time I went to a private art school in the evenings.
0:23:35 > 0:23:39I saw myself drawing for a while while I worked out what I was
0:23:39 > 0:23:41- going to be when I grew up. - ALAN LAUGHS
0:23:41 > 0:23:45And then I gave it up for some years. I decided I didn't have
0:23:45 > 0:23:48the way with... I didn't have the right to be an artist.
0:23:49 > 0:23:52And then I tried to become an actor and failed at that.
0:23:52 > 0:23:55Went to theatre school and failed at that.
0:23:55 > 0:23:59And after some years I found I was back in the studio making drawings.
0:24:17 > 0:24:22Kentridge's 1991 film Mine is about the industry on which
0:24:22 > 0:24:26Johannesburg and Soho Eckstein's wealth is based.
0:24:26 > 0:24:29The gold reef that stretches for over 50km
0:24:29 > 0:24:32was the richest gold deposit in the world.
0:24:34 > 0:24:36It made fortunes for some.
0:24:36 > 0:24:39It was extracted by an army of black miners
0:24:39 > 0:24:42who were paid virtually slave wages.
0:24:48 > 0:24:51Even today, mining is the largest industry
0:24:51 > 0:24:53in the area around Johannesburg.
0:24:57 > 0:24:59Where are we now? Where are we travelling?
0:24:59 > 0:25:02We are now going east from the centre of Johannesburg
0:25:02 > 0:25:05basically following towards Germiston and Benoni
0:25:05 > 0:25:07the line of the reef of gold.
0:25:07 > 0:25:11Johannesburg, remember, is built on what's under the ground,
0:25:11 > 0:25:15which is the gold under the ground discovered in 1886.
0:25:15 > 0:25:20BELL
0:25:21 > 0:25:25The landscape is still scarred by the mine dumps that are now
0:25:25 > 0:25:27being demolished and processed.
0:25:36 > 0:25:40The orange hill there is simply earth that's been taken out
0:25:40 > 0:25:43of the ground from the mines, the leftovers of the mines.
0:25:43 > 0:25:45The gold has been taken out
0:25:45 > 0:25:48but because it's an imperfect and was an imperfect process,
0:25:48 > 0:25:52there was a certain minute percentage of gold left in the dump,
0:25:52 > 0:25:53- as it is called.- That's the dump.
0:25:53 > 0:25:55That's the dump there.
0:25:55 > 0:25:58But what's happening now, you can see there's earth-moving equipment
0:25:58 > 0:26:00on top and what they're doing in fact is scraping the whole
0:26:00 > 0:26:05of that mountain away because they now have new metallurgical processes
0:26:05 > 0:26:11that can leach out the last 0.001% of gold that's still in that hill.
0:26:18 > 0:26:22And you also sometimes see in this area these zama zamas,
0:26:22 > 0:26:25these illegal and former miners in the informal economy,
0:26:25 > 0:26:30who walk across carrying bags of rocks, either from the tailings
0:26:30 > 0:26:33or from mines themselves, which they will physically reprocess,
0:26:33 > 0:26:38to hope after some weeks' work to get a Coke bottle capful of gold.
0:26:48 > 0:26:53So over here you have what was an old shaft from an official mine.
0:26:53 > 0:26:58It's probably from 1905 or something. It's now been abandoned.
0:26:58 > 0:27:00- Don't fall in.- Right.
0:27:00 > 0:27:03It's probably a few hundred feet open, unprotected hole.
0:27:07 > 0:27:11Let's try that one. We should be able to do the maths to count it.
0:27:11 > 0:27:13Let's just see.
0:27:13 > 0:27:16One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi,
0:27:16 > 0:27:22four Mississippi, five Mississippi, six Mississippi,
0:27:22 > 0:27:25seven Mississippi, eight Mississippi...
0:27:25 > 0:27:26God, it's still going.
0:27:26 > 0:27:27About eight seconds.
0:27:29 > 0:27:32- It's still going. - It's still going down.
0:27:45 > 0:27:50Next to the abandoned shaft we met Daniel, an illegal miner,
0:27:50 > 0:27:54who was digging at the rock face in the hope of finding gold.
0:27:54 > 0:27:57Hi. Hello. Hello. How are you? Are you having any luck
0:27:57 > 0:28:00finding some gold?
0:28:00 > 0:28:05- This is it.- This is it. Gold. - This is pure gold.
0:28:05 > 0:28:08- That's about a gram, you think? - Yeah.
0:28:08 > 0:28:12- Gosh, that's good. Can I feel it?- Yes.
0:28:12 > 0:28:14So that's the weight of the gold.
0:28:15 > 0:28:17Great.
0:28:22 > 0:28:24'Daniel was panning for the gold
0:28:24 > 0:28:28'which he can sell for 450 rands a gram,
0:28:28 > 0:28:32'about £20, enough to feed his family for a week.'
0:28:34 > 0:28:37- This is more gold. - That's gold at the edges.- Yes.
0:28:37 > 0:28:41That little piece there. Gosh, so it's black,
0:28:41 > 0:28:44- it's not gold shining. It's not shining.- It's not really shining.
0:28:48 > 0:28:51Stand right there.
0:28:52 > 0:28:55This is like the start of the next film.
0:28:55 > 0:28:57ALAN LAUGHS
0:28:57 > 0:29:00- I'm Soho Eckstein. - Just to get a proportion, yes.
0:29:00 > 0:29:03Just look down sideways. I just want to take a picture.
0:29:05 > 0:29:08Soho at the edge of one of these holes.
0:29:17 > 0:29:20I used to always think what an ugly landscape we had
0:29:20 > 0:29:21around Johannesburg.
0:29:21 > 0:29:24There aren't grand trees, there's not rivers, there's not mountains.
0:29:24 > 0:29:27All the things one would associate with beautiful landscape.
0:29:27 > 0:29:33But having said that, once I started to draw it, the way this terrain
0:29:33 > 0:29:37in front meets the process of drawing became very exciting.
0:29:37 > 0:29:41Now you cannot find me an ugly enough piece of landscape
0:29:41 > 0:29:42that I do not find beautiful.
0:29:59 > 0:30:02INDISTINCT CHATTER
0:30:04 > 0:30:10In Sobriety, Obesity and Growing Old Soho Eckstein's industrial
0:30:10 > 0:30:15empire is collapsing in the face of forces that are beyond his control.
0:30:16 > 0:30:21It was 1991 and the film reflected a seismic change
0:30:21 > 0:30:24that was taking place in South Africa at the time.
0:30:26 > 0:30:30Should Parliament adopt the government's proposal,
0:30:30 > 0:30:32the South African statute book
0:30:32 > 0:30:36will be devoid within months of the remnants
0:30:36 > 0:30:39of the racially discriminatory legislation
0:30:39 > 0:30:42which have become known as the cornerstones of apartheid.
0:30:47 > 0:30:51In 1990, the new nationalist prime minister, FW De Klerk,
0:30:51 > 0:30:55astonished the world by setting the country on the path to
0:30:55 > 0:30:57becoming a multiracial democracy.
0:31:00 > 0:31:02So this is after the big transformation.
0:31:02 > 0:31:071990 is when the president announces that the ANC will be unbanned,
0:31:07 > 0:31:11Mandela will be released, and we understand South Africa
0:31:11 > 0:31:14is starting this process of transformation.
0:31:16 > 0:31:21So it was a period in which there were a lot of these huge,
0:31:21 > 0:31:25fantastic marches through the city with all the different banners.
0:31:25 > 0:31:27The red banners of the Communist Party
0:31:27 > 0:31:29that had been banned all those years.
0:31:32 > 0:31:37- ARCHIVE:- 'And the crowd getting excited. There's Mr Mandela,
0:31:37 > 0:31:41'Mr Nelson Mandela, a free man,
0:31:41 > 0:31:45'taking his first steps into a new South Africa.'
0:32:00 > 0:32:05The political changes ushered in a period of uncertainty
0:32:05 > 0:32:07as South Africa took a step into the unknown.
0:32:11 > 0:32:15- And this is again Soho Eckstein's...- Empire.- Empire, yeah.
0:32:15 > 0:32:19An empire which will soon not be Soho Eckstein's.
0:32:19 > 0:32:23Yes, and in this film it's very much about the impossibility of
0:32:23 > 0:32:24him knowing what to do.
0:32:24 > 0:32:28MOURNFUL BALLAD
0:32:37 > 0:32:41UPBEAT MUSIC
0:32:51 > 0:32:55Downtown Johannesburg was a no-go area for years but it's now
0:32:55 > 0:32:59beginning to be transformed, and Kentridge has built
0:32:59 > 0:33:02another studio in a disused warehouse
0:33:02 > 0:33:05in an inner-city neighbourhood called Maboneng
0:33:05 > 0:33:07that's become a new creative quarter.
0:33:13 > 0:33:17The studio is populated with the everyday objects that make up
0:33:17 > 0:33:19his familiar iconography.
0:33:21 > 0:33:24- Hi. Good morning. - This is your new home.
0:33:24 > 0:33:26The new home. The other home.
0:33:28 > 0:33:32- I love that.- This is in the piece on Trotsky, O Sentimental Machine.
0:33:32 > 0:33:37- Yeah.- But we've now modified it to have a kind of proximity receptor
0:33:37 > 0:33:40so it switches itself on and off...
0:33:40 > 0:33:42- So as we passed it... - As we passed it
0:33:42 > 0:33:45it recognised us and it beats its heart for a few seconds
0:33:45 > 0:33:47and then it will stop.
0:33:47 > 0:33:49It will come back on when you go.
0:33:49 > 0:33:53CHIMING AND BLARING
0:33:53 > 0:33:58The larger studio gave William the space to construct new inventions,
0:33:58 > 0:34:01adapt found objects, and make models for the operas
0:34:01 > 0:34:04he directs in opera houses round the world.
0:34:10 > 0:34:15So it's a mixture of drawings that we used in Lulu, and filmed
0:34:15 > 0:34:18performers and actors and dancers, which we filmed for Lulu
0:34:18 > 0:34:20but really hardly used, didn't use.
0:34:21 > 0:34:24But this for example was Jack the Ripper in the opera,
0:34:24 > 0:34:25an image of him.
0:34:28 > 0:34:33CHANTING
0:34:33 > 0:34:36BRASS BAND PLAYS
0:34:39 > 0:34:43The new studio also allowed William to make his films
0:34:43 > 0:34:45on a much bigger scale.
0:34:47 > 0:34:52Working with local performers and musicians, he created a multiscreen
0:34:52 > 0:34:55projection that fills an entire gallery,
0:34:55 > 0:34:58called More Sweetly Play the Dance,
0:34:58 > 0:35:04an epic procession that combines live action and animation.
0:35:12 > 0:35:15And did you rehearse More Sweetly here?
0:35:15 > 0:35:18More Sweetly Play the Dance gets filmed
0:35:18 > 0:35:20along a long platform along the edge of the wall,
0:35:20 > 0:35:23lighting the wall to give us a neutral background
0:35:23 > 0:35:27and then it's matted onto a drawn animation.
0:35:27 > 0:35:30And this is used in that for all the scenes that happen on trolleys.
0:35:36 > 0:35:40The trolleys in the film are an everyday sight in Johannesburg,
0:35:40 > 0:35:44pulled by an army of recyclers who sift through the city's rubbish
0:35:44 > 0:35:47and survive on the very edge of society.
0:36:09 > 0:36:13The extraordinary thing that the trolley recyclers show you
0:36:13 > 0:36:17is how much human labour power is still the engine of
0:36:17 > 0:36:21so much of work and industry in South Africa.
0:36:21 > 0:36:25So you have the informal economy, which are these people who
0:36:25 > 0:36:28go through the rubbish, put it on these piles and drag it
0:36:28 > 0:36:31physically uphill and down the hills to the recycling depots.
0:36:31 > 0:36:36And you understand that they have no protection at all.
0:36:36 > 0:36:39There's no health benefit, they're not employed by anyone.
0:36:39 > 0:36:42If they're sick they just starve.
0:36:42 > 0:36:47And they are intimately connected to the large-scale recycling companies
0:36:47 > 0:36:51whose workers are unionised, have all the benefits of unionisation.
0:36:51 > 0:36:55But that big company in the formal economy is only possible
0:36:55 > 0:36:59through the work of everyone in the informal economy.
0:36:59 > 0:37:03So that mixture goes throughout industry, throughout the country
0:37:03 > 0:37:06and is a vital part of the logic of the whole country.
0:37:08 > 0:37:13A CAPPELLA BALLAD
0:37:21 > 0:37:25STRINGS
0:37:49 > 0:37:51CHANTING
0:37:51 > 0:37:56- ARCHIVE:- 'A slaughter of innocents. Babies as well as men and women
0:37:56 > 0:37:59'gunned down at point-blank range or hacked to death.
0:37:59 > 0:38:02'Victims selected at random, many of them as they lay in their beds.
0:38:02 > 0:38:05'Victims of a township war that's become an ugly
0:38:05 > 0:38:08'but inescapable aspect of politics in South Africa.'
0:38:11 > 0:38:16South Africa's transition to democracy in the early 1990s
0:38:16 > 0:38:20was nearly derailed by violence on all sides.
0:38:20 > 0:38:24Bombings by the far right and a series of township massacres
0:38:24 > 0:38:28threatened to plunge the country into full-scale civil war.
0:38:37 > 0:38:41The impulse behind it came from a whole lot of police photographs
0:38:41 > 0:38:44of bodies in the landscape. Bodies in the film.
0:38:46 > 0:38:50And the specific individual figures that are drawn are based very much
0:38:50 > 0:38:53on these police photographs of these people
0:38:53 > 0:38:54who'd been killed, some of them
0:38:54 > 0:38:58in ordinary criminal violence, but a lot in political violence.
0:38:58 > 0:39:02- This was a very difficult time, wasn't it?- This is 1994.
0:39:02 > 0:39:07This is the period just before our first democratic election
0:39:07 > 0:39:09which at the time was very much in doubt.
0:39:09 > 0:39:14The lead-up to the election was mired in blood and deaths.
0:39:16 > 0:39:19And one of the questions I had was, after this is over, when we've
0:39:19 > 0:39:23got our transformed society, in what ways this is remembered.
0:39:23 > 0:39:26Do these people still have a place?
0:39:26 > 0:39:30Will they disappear in the way the bodies disappear into the landscape?
0:39:39 > 0:39:43Those bodies in the veld are forensic photographs
0:39:43 > 0:39:48I saw then in 1994, but also memories of photographs
0:39:48 > 0:39:50I'd seen in my father's study
0:39:50 > 0:39:54of people shot at the time of the Sharpeville massacre in 1960,
0:39:54 > 0:39:56when I was five or six.
0:39:57 > 0:40:01- And your father was...- My father was a lawyer for the families
0:40:01 > 0:40:05of the victims at the inquest into the Sharpeville massacre.
0:40:06 > 0:40:10BRASS BAND PLAYS SOLEMNLY
0:40:18 > 0:40:22- ARCHIVE:- 'From time to time in history, the name of
0:40:22 > 0:40:24'an insignificant place
0:40:24 > 0:40:26'burns itself into the memory of mankind
0:40:26 > 0:40:29'simply because of something that happened there.
0:40:29 > 0:40:34'Places like Guernica, and Lidice, and Belsen.
0:40:34 > 0:40:37'And today there may well be another.
0:40:37 > 0:40:40'Sharpeville near Johannesburg in South Africa.'
0:40:44 > 0:40:45So where are you taking us to now?
0:40:45 > 0:40:50We're going south of Johannesburg, about an hour south of Johannesburg,
0:40:50 > 0:40:56to Vereeniging, an industrial town on the edge of the Vaal river which
0:40:56 > 0:41:01is most well known for the township outside of it called Sharpeville.
0:41:07 > 0:41:12- ARCHIVE:- 'More than 60 Africans, including women and children,
0:41:12 > 0:41:15'were killed and more than 170 were injured when the police
0:41:15 > 0:41:18'opened fire on a crowd estimated at 20,000
0:41:18 > 0:41:22'which had surrounded Sharpeville police station.
0:41:22 > 0:41:23'The shootings happened
0:41:23 > 0:41:26'during a demonstration against the so-called pass laws.'
0:41:26 > 0:41:30BRASS BAND PLAYS
0:41:37 > 0:41:41William was taking us to Sharpeville because the brass band that
0:41:41 > 0:41:44performed in More Sweetly Played the Dance comes from there.
0:41:48 > 0:41:52His wife Anne, who is a practising doctor, came with us.
0:41:55 > 0:42:00- So, Anne, why did you come with us today?- William wanted me to come.
0:42:00 > 0:42:02Why did you want Anne to come today?
0:42:02 > 0:42:04I wanted her also to see the brass band.
0:42:04 > 0:42:06The band is so fabulous.
0:42:10 > 0:42:14Brass bands are an integral part of township life.
0:42:14 > 0:42:18They play at weddings and funerals and form the kind of
0:42:18 > 0:42:21public processions that appear so often in Kentridge's work.
0:42:21 > 0:42:24BRASS BAND PLAYS
0:42:48 > 0:42:51- ARCHIVE:- 'It has been a day of endless queues, of confusion,
0:42:51 > 0:42:55'at polling stations which didn't open, and others which ran out of
0:42:55 > 0:42:58'ballot papers, but above all it has been a day of hope.'
0:43:01 > 0:43:06On 27 April 1994, South Africans of all races
0:43:06 > 0:43:10voted in the country's first truly democratic election.
0:43:11 > 0:43:13CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
0:43:13 > 0:43:19I'm very happy about the election. We've been waiting very long.
0:43:19 > 0:43:24I'm excited. I want to look forward for the new South Africa.
0:43:25 > 0:43:30The election was won overwhelmingly by the ANC
0:43:30 > 0:43:33and Nelson Mandela became the new president.
0:43:34 > 0:43:38I was very happy that we're doing the right thing.
0:43:41 > 0:43:48I, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, do hereby swear,
0:43:48 > 0:43:53to be faithful to the Republic of South Africa.
0:43:55 > 0:43:56So help me, God.
0:43:56 > 0:44:00BRASS BAND PLAYS
0:44:45 > 0:44:51CHORAL SINGING
0:45:20 > 0:45:23This film was made in 1996.
0:45:23 > 0:45:281996 was the period of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission,
0:45:28 > 0:45:32of looking at responsibilities for crimes against humanity
0:45:32 > 0:45:35during the apartheid era.
0:45:37 > 0:45:39And in a way this film looks at
0:45:39 > 0:45:42questions of responsibility or guilt.
0:45:45 > 0:45:49The images in the film very much come from lying in bed
0:45:49 > 0:45:53next to my wife Anne, and she in bed with medical textbooks,
0:45:53 > 0:45:55and she explained that when you take a history of someone,
0:45:55 > 0:45:59their medical history, you take a history of the main complaint,
0:45:59 > 0:46:02the main thing that's wrong with people.
0:46:02 > 0:46:06So "a history of the main complaint" is a technical medical term.
0:46:06 > 0:46:09But it's obviously so evocative of things beyond the medical
0:46:09 > 0:46:11that it became the title.
0:46:11 > 0:46:15What is the main complaint of our society?
0:46:15 > 0:46:18The painful history that we have.
0:46:21 > 0:46:23The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was set up
0:46:23 > 0:46:28in 1996 to investigate atrocities that were committed
0:46:28 > 0:46:31during the apartheid period.
0:46:31 > 0:46:35It took them nine hours to burn his body.
0:46:35 > 0:46:39Dirk Coetzee further says that whilst they were burning his body
0:46:39 > 0:46:42the flesh was smelling good.
0:46:42 > 0:46:47Victims were given the opportunity to testify, and perpetrators
0:46:47 > 0:46:52were allowed to apply for amnesty if they confessed to their crimes.
0:46:53 > 0:46:58It became a very painful public outpouring of anger and grief
0:46:58 > 0:47:02on all sides. BELLS RINGING
0:47:24 > 0:47:30The relationship of forgiveness. What is the impossibility?
0:47:30 > 0:47:34And the impossibility of the idea of forgiveness.
0:47:34 > 0:47:37What is it that you have to give to be forgiven?
0:47:37 > 0:47:39What does it mean to forgive?
0:47:39 > 0:47:43To relinquish giving or to take the giving?
0:47:43 > 0:47:46MOURNFUL STRINGS
0:47:58 > 0:48:02How long do the films take to make? And do you decide on the music
0:48:02 > 0:48:08before you embark on the project or do things change as you go through?
0:48:08 > 0:48:13Generally an animation, eight-minute animation will, say,
0:48:13 > 0:48:15will take nine months of drawing to do.
0:48:15 > 0:48:18But at many stages along the way rushes will come back,
0:48:18 > 0:48:2130 seconds of film, a minute of film,
0:48:21 > 0:48:24and I would look that with the composer Philip Miller,
0:48:24 > 0:48:26and with Philip we will very often test a range
0:48:26 > 0:48:30of different pieces of music with these different film fragments
0:48:30 > 0:48:34and find what kind of music, what sort of music we should be using.
0:48:34 > 0:48:36And then the music has six months to develop
0:48:36 > 0:48:38while the rest of the film is being made.
0:48:40 > 0:48:43So this huge space, where is your Triumph Orchestra
0:48:43 > 0:48:44and where is your Lament Orchestra?
0:48:44 > 0:48:48My Triumph Orchestra is the furthest room.
0:48:48 > 0:48:53For the performance in Rome, Kentridge's frequent collaborator,
0:48:53 > 0:48:57the composer Philip Miller, worked with two orchestras,
0:48:57 > 0:48:59one for triumphs and one for laments,
0:48:59 > 0:49:02which would play simultaneously on the night.
0:49:02 > 0:49:04You can hear the music.
0:49:04 > 0:49:06Take the cue from the music that we're hearing.
0:49:08 > 0:49:12We keep Triumphs and Laments far apart for the moment
0:49:12 > 0:49:17to really get the sense that they are these two opposing forces
0:49:17 > 0:49:23or energies, and at some point we are going to then put them together
0:49:23 > 0:49:24which ultimately will be
0:49:24 > 0:49:28where the two groups eventually meet on the river.
0:49:28 > 0:49:30- So these two processions... - These are processions.
0:49:30 > 0:49:33And then here of course they are making the clothes and preparing
0:49:33 > 0:49:38- the shadows.- It's very much in William Kentridge fashion.
0:49:38 > 0:49:41Many things happen in one space at the same time.
0:49:41 > 0:49:43This is truly the way he often works
0:49:43 > 0:49:47is that you'll have costume designs being made in one room,
0:49:47 > 0:49:50engineer building sculptures in another,
0:49:50 > 0:49:52which can create havoc for a composer.
0:49:52 > 0:49:55And then you have musicians working as well.
0:49:55 > 0:49:59So all of this is happening in this huge tremendous space.
0:49:59 > 0:50:04ORCHESTRA PLAYS WITH CHORUS
0:50:19 > 0:50:22This commemoration of Rome,
0:50:22 > 0:50:26this is also every year the time of Passover, 21 April,
0:50:26 > 0:50:30so the Passover is the big migration from Egypt of the Jews as well.
0:50:30 > 0:50:35Exactly. What drew me to the story of the Jews going into exile
0:50:35 > 0:50:38was my thoughts around exile and Exodus,
0:50:38 > 0:50:40of course thinking constantly
0:50:40 > 0:50:44about the images of people being forced into exile, whether
0:50:44 > 0:50:49it's Syria or Ethiopia, it's clear that with the last few years
0:50:49 > 0:50:52we see people walking with their suitcases,
0:50:52 > 0:50:56trudging along in huge processional lines across Europe.
0:50:59 > 0:51:02ORCHESTRA PLAYS
0:51:02 > 0:51:05Philip used a Zulu troubadour
0:51:05 > 0:51:09and African singers and instruments
0:51:09 > 0:51:11to bring to life the monumental frieze
0:51:11 > 0:51:13that William has created along the river.
0:51:26 > 0:51:30So here is the she-wolf.
0:51:30 > 0:51:33This is the famous she-wolf which is in fact an Etruscan image,
0:51:33 > 0:51:36pre-Roman image, but then Romulus and Remus
0:51:36 > 0:51:38and the little familiar sculptures
0:51:38 > 0:51:41are in fact an addition 2,000 years later.
0:51:41 > 0:51:44- So Romulus and Remus... - Become these two vessels.
0:51:44 > 0:51:48So it needs to be the original image but with a slight twist.
0:51:48 > 0:51:51And the texture here of the wall, it does evoke what you've been
0:51:51 > 0:51:53- showing me...- In those books. - In those books.
0:51:59 > 0:52:03- And on the other side of the black gap...- What is the black gap?
0:52:03 > 0:52:06The black gap - that which I do not remember.
0:52:06 > 0:52:10It stands both for acknowledging the sense of partial history
0:52:10 > 0:52:12but also for those parts of history
0:52:12 > 0:52:15that we either choose not to remember
0:52:15 > 0:52:16or are blocked from remembering.
0:52:16 > 0:52:18Well, it's a reminder also about memory
0:52:18 > 0:52:20and about how much is forgotten.
0:52:20 > 0:52:23It is... And the wall does that because the wall is both
0:52:23 > 0:52:26like a present memory now and then it will fade away
0:52:26 > 0:52:28after five years or so and it will be like
0:52:28 > 0:52:31something you should remember but it's kind of gone.
0:52:35 > 0:52:37So this is half a kilometre that we've walked.
0:52:37 > 0:52:39This is half a kilometre that we've walked.
0:52:41 > 0:52:45So this is again a contemporary image that we've seen both
0:52:45 > 0:52:47throughout Africa, but in the last years,
0:52:47 > 0:52:49of people making their way to Europe.
0:52:52 > 0:52:55BALLAD
0:53:05 > 0:53:10The same obsession with migration and the chance to experiment
0:53:10 > 0:53:14with scale drew Kentridge to a medium that might seem unlikely.
0:53:19 > 0:53:22Now we're driving north from Johannesburg.
0:53:22 > 0:53:28And halfway between Johannesburg and Pretoria is the area Diepsloot
0:53:28 > 0:53:32where Marguerite Stephens has her weaving studio.
0:53:34 > 0:53:37The tapestries themselves are a way which one can work
0:53:37 > 0:53:39in the way you work with a projection.
0:53:39 > 0:53:42You can start with a small drawing and then throw
0:53:42 > 0:53:44a projector and it gets enlarged to the size of a wall.
0:53:44 > 0:53:49There's a way in which tapestry is also an enlargement of
0:53:49 > 0:53:52an initial drawing that might be that size.
0:53:52 > 0:53:55And then gets enlarged to be a wall-sized image.
0:54:01 > 0:54:05There's such dexterity. It's a bit like watching a harp being played.
0:54:10 > 0:54:13All right. Hi.
0:54:16 > 0:54:19- Hello.- Hello.- Hi. This is Alan Yentob.- How do you do?
0:54:19 > 0:54:22Marguerite Stephens. This is her studio.
0:54:22 > 0:54:27The studio is run by master weaver Marguerite Stephens.
0:54:27 > 0:54:33She employs 13 highly skilled local women weavers.
0:54:33 > 0:54:38The hugely detailed tapestries are based on everything from
0:54:38 > 0:54:42Russian constructivism to migration and polar exploration.
0:54:42 > 0:54:46We are weaving a tapestry called South Polar Regions.
0:54:46 > 0:54:48I think it's wonderful.
0:54:48 > 0:54:52- This is based on one of the stencils from Rome.- Yeah.
0:54:52 > 0:54:54Of the procession of refugees.
0:54:58 > 0:55:02Many of the tapestries relate to the operas that William
0:55:02 > 0:55:05has designed and directed in Europe and America.
0:55:07 > 0:55:11Nose is the opera by Shostakovich, based on the short story by Gogol,
0:55:11 > 0:55:16that was produced, that I directed at the Met Opera in 2010.
0:55:16 > 0:55:18In New York.
0:55:18 > 0:55:21This was first done as a banner, printed as a banner,
0:55:21 > 0:55:24and then the banner we translated into the tapestry.
0:55:24 > 0:55:27The legend at the bottom was the phrase used,
0:55:27 > 0:55:30it was the English phrase used in Soviet films of the time of Stalin,
0:55:30 > 0:55:32where they all had to have what was called a "kheppi ending",
0:55:32 > 0:55:35a happy ending. "Another Kheppi Ending."
0:55:35 > 0:55:38If you wouldn't mind coming to help her.
0:55:43 > 0:55:44INDISTINCT
0:55:45 > 0:55:48There is a sequence in the opera
0:55:48 > 0:55:50in which the Nose goes on its own journey,
0:55:50 > 0:55:53and we had a lot of the Nose riding different horses
0:55:53 > 0:55:57so it's a fragmented horse. A horse that shouldn't really be ridden.
0:55:57 > 0:56:01There used to be a tapestry, like the Gobelins tapestries
0:56:01 > 0:56:03were the most valuable artworks ever made.
0:56:03 > 0:56:06So if you were a king marrying a queen,
0:56:06 > 0:56:09a suitable gift from another king or queen would be a tapestry.
0:56:09 > 0:56:13An oil painting was like giving someone a vase of flowers.
0:56:13 > 0:56:14It was of no value.
0:56:14 > 0:56:18But old tapestries, because they embodied so much human labour time
0:56:18 > 0:56:19in their making...
0:56:19 > 0:56:23So tell me about all these ladies who are working on it.
0:56:23 > 0:56:27Treasure is one of my senior weavers.
0:56:27 > 0:56:31William's work is a bit difficult but at the same time it's very good
0:56:31 > 0:56:34and challenging. So sometimes you have to feel what you're doing
0:56:34 > 0:56:39because art is about feeling. You cannot just weave anything.
0:56:39 > 0:56:43You also have to understand it yourself before you do anything.
0:56:43 > 0:56:46And I notice that your name, along with other names,
0:56:46 > 0:56:47is on those tapestries,
0:56:47 > 0:56:50so do you feel that you are one of the artists as well?
0:56:50 > 0:56:52Yes, I am.
0:56:52 > 0:56:54And I know myself that's what I'm telling people,
0:56:54 > 0:56:56I'm also an artist because whatever I'm doing
0:56:56 > 0:57:00I'm paying a lot of attention and I'm also making myself available
0:57:00 > 0:57:01and trying to be artistic myself
0:57:01 > 0:57:04because I cannot just weave a tapestry,
0:57:04 > 0:57:07I have to relate to it, so I'm also an artist, definitely.
0:57:07 > 0:57:08SHE LAUGHS
0:57:09 > 0:57:13A CAPPELLA BALLAD
0:57:43 > 0:57:46William, how much has Johannesburg changed since you were growing up?
0:57:47 > 0:57:51That's 60 years. I think it's like so much in South Africa.
0:57:51 > 0:57:53There are two things.
0:57:53 > 0:57:58It's changed enormously, but huge areas of it have stayed identical.
0:58:00 > 0:58:05The basic structure of the leafy, privileged white suburbs
0:58:05 > 0:58:07being to the north of the city
0:58:07 > 0:58:10and the majority of the working class living in Soweto
0:58:10 > 0:58:12and in the townships around Johannesburg
0:58:12 > 0:58:14is fundamentally the same.
0:58:14 > 0:58:17There are some pockets in which the new black middle class
0:58:17 > 0:58:21has moved into, but essentially they remain as white suburbs.
0:58:21 > 0:58:23- That's what I sense. - Astonishingly so.
0:58:24 > 0:58:28The one thing you can see is a kind of an archaeology of fear
0:58:28 > 0:58:30with the height of walls that have grown.
0:58:30 > 0:58:34When I was a child they were very low, walls were waist-high.
0:58:34 > 0:58:39There was a sense that danger was kept 20 miles away in Soweto,
0:58:39 > 0:58:40outside the city.
0:58:40 > 0:58:45And that from each political ruction in South Africa
0:58:45 > 0:58:47has changed the nature of garden walls.
0:59:08 > 0:59:1322 years after the first democratic elections, South Africa
0:59:13 > 0:59:17is a very different place, but for the majority
0:59:17 > 0:59:21life has barely improved and racial tension continues.
0:59:23 > 0:59:29So Other Faces, which is the most recent of the Soho Eckstein films,
0:59:29 > 0:59:34it's shot around 2010-11 in Johannesburg, and The Rage,
0:59:34 > 0:59:38a piece of road rage which I witnessed
0:59:38 > 0:59:41between a black driver and a white driver
0:59:41 > 0:59:45over a very minor dispute, but the quality and quantity
0:59:45 > 0:59:48of rage was so much larger than the event.
0:59:48 > 0:59:52You felt that a whole history was boiling away inside.
0:59:54 > 0:59:57- Still not forgiven. - Still not forgiven at all.
0:59:59 > 1:00:04And the big questions of race and reparation which have never
1:00:04 > 1:00:07been completely dealt with and which sit there
1:00:07 > 1:00:09still very present in South Africa today.
1:00:20 > 1:00:22INDISTINCT
1:00:25 > 1:00:30With its shameful past and perilous present, South Africa
1:00:30 > 1:00:32is a complex and disorientating place.
1:00:37 > 1:00:39William has spent his life here and its striking,
1:00:39 > 1:00:43often painful contrasts lie behind all his work.
1:01:14 > 1:01:15South Africa is complicated.
1:01:15 > 1:01:18On the one hand everybody has a nostalgia for elements of
1:01:18 > 1:01:21their childhood, tastes which one had as a child
1:01:21 > 1:01:24which one never recaptures, which one's always longing for.
1:01:24 > 1:01:30But also an understanding of the unnaturalness
1:01:30 > 1:01:35and the distortion that that childhood necessarily had
1:01:35 > 1:01:38because of the circumstances in which it was lived.
1:01:40 > 1:01:44So there's always a guilt associated with nostalgia as well.
1:01:55 > 1:02:00- Is this Soho Eckstein crying? - It's Soho leaking.
1:02:00 > 1:02:02It's something much more than just tears.
1:02:02 > 1:02:06It's like a real inside spreading out and flooding him.
1:02:24 > 1:02:26INDISTINCT
1:02:26 > 1:02:28If you're telling someone else to do it
1:02:28 > 1:02:30you have to have the illusion of knowing...
1:02:30 > 1:02:33William Kentridge is an artist of global stature
1:02:33 > 1:02:38whose work is shown in museums and opera houses around the world.
1:02:38 > 1:02:41His production of Alban Berg's Lulu opened recently
1:02:41 > 1:02:44at English National Opera to huge acclaim
1:02:44 > 1:02:49and his current exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery in London
1:02:49 > 1:02:51is on till January 15th.
1:02:58 > 1:03:02'29 seconds. 31 seconds.'
1:03:04 > 1:03:06People say, "Well, how does art function?"
1:03:06 > 1:03:09- It kind of functions like this. - Yeah.
1:03:09 > 1:03:11It's an unnecessary, useless activity that is vital.