Strauss & co - 16 February 2019, Cape Town

102 81 William Kentridge SOUTH AFRICAN 1955– Preparations in the Ante-Chamber signed, dated ‘86 and inscribed with the title; inscribed with the artist’s name and title on an Everard Read Gallery label adhered to the reverse charcoal with white gold paint and pastel on paper 100 by 70 cm R1 500 000 – 2 000 000 PROVENANCE Purchased from Die Kunskamer by the current owner in 1996. EXHIBITED This work was on loan to the Oppenheimer Library, University of Cape Town, from 2001–2017, catalogue number 19. ‘The show goes on in the background of this image, spot lit and enlarged for all to see. In the middle- ground shadowy figures move and talk with a sense of purpose. And in the foreground, behind the scenes of the theatre, stand two bound black figures, wounded and scored, testimony to the brutal truth of apartheid. The chilling reality of South Africa is encapsulated in this succinct image of illusions and layers of reality, reminiscent of a world sustained by fictions behind which evil plots are hatched and perpetrated.’ Julia Teale. (2001) ‘Works from a private collection of contemporary South African art on permanent loan to The Chancellor Oppenheimer Library, University of Cape Town’. Unpaginated.