William Kentridge

(born 1955)

Casspirs Full of Love, 1989

Footnotes

Literature
Neal Benezra, Staci Boris and Dan Cameron, William Kentridge (Chicago: Museum of Contemporary Art and New York: Harry N. Abrams Publishers, 2001) p. 80
Dan Cameron, Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, J.M. Coetzee, William Kentridge (London and New York: Phaidon Press Limited, 1999) p.50
Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, William Kentridge (Brussels: Société des Expositions du Palais des Beaux-Arts de Bruxelles, 1998), pg. 29
Judith B. Hecker and William Kentridge, William Kentridge – Trace – Prints from the Museum of Modern Art (Verona: Trifolio SRL, 2010) p.19
Milena Kalinovska and Eric Denker, William Kentridge, Oleg Kudryashov: Against the Grain (Washington, DC: The Kreeger Museum, Washington, 2009) p.16
William Kentridge, William Kentridge: Prints (Johannesburg: David Krut Publishing, 2006) pp. 36-37
Margaret K. Koerner, William Kentridge: Smoke, Ashes, Fable (Brussels: Mercatorfonds, 2017) p.31

Casspirs Full of Love as a group of works is a testament to William Kentridge's multi-disciplinary and multi-layered practice. The various incarnations of the subject, made between 1988 and 1989, include a drawing, an encaustic, a screenprinted banner and the present drypoint, itself printed in two phases, between 1989 and 2000.

The satirical title of the work, inscribed prominently to the right in looping cursive handwriting, refers to a personal message overheard by Kentridge on a popular radio program, from a mother to her son in the white South African defence force: this message comes to you from your mom with Casspirs full of love. Casspirs were armoured riot-control vehicles deployed by the South African defence force under the National Party regime of apartheid (1948-94), for the forceful patrol of black townships during the state of emergency declared in 1985 and renewed until 1990, leading to arbitrary racial arrests and persecution. The tense juxtaposition of love and death, affection and violence, also expressed textually: what comfort now? at left, Not A Step at lower centre, highlight the contradictions inherent to the apartheid state.

The work also resonates with scenes from William Kentridge's 1989 film Johannesburg, 2nd Greatest City after Paris (see Lot 1 on previous page), while the heads were inspired by drawings the artist made in 1988 in Florence, based on Giotto's early 14th century frescoes in Santa Croce, that he later cut up and rearranged, and were also influenced by a Tony Cragg bronze sculpture of carved beetroot heads he saw in Florence that same year.

As William Kentridge said: The print became a combination of Giotto, Cragg and 1980s South African radio. It has come to be known as one of Kentridge's most overtly political projects, and its importance is reflected in the fact that impressions of the print appear in significant international collections such as those of the Metropolitan Museum and the MOMA in New York, the Johannesburg Art Gallery, and the Tate in London.

Printmaking has always been primary to Kentridge's practice as an artist, and the highly charged, textural surface and intensity of contrasts in the inking and composition of Casspirs Full of Love demonstrate his masterful exploration of the etching and drypoint mediums. The impression presented here provides the final version of the image as printed by master printer Jack Shirreff at 107 Workshop, Wiltshire, England in 2000.

Bibliography
William Kentridge, William Kentridge: Prints (Johannesburg: David Krut Publishing, 2006) p. 36
Roger Malbert, 'William Kentridge: Printmaker' in A Universal Archive: William Kentridge as Printmaker (London: Hayward Publishing, 2012) p. 13
Elizabeth Manchester, William Kentridge: Casspirs Full of Love (London: Tate, 2002)