South African and International Art, Decorative Arts & Jewellery

Online-Only Auction, 9 - 16 July 2018

Prints and Multiples

Sold for

ZAR 35 175
Lot 48
  • William Kentridge; Forswearing Bad Company, from the Industry and Idleness series
  • William Kentridge; Forswearing Bad Company, from the Industry and Idleness series
  • William Kentridge; Forswearing Bad Company, from the Industry and Idleness series
  • William Kentridge; Forswearing Bad Company, from the Industry and Idleness series
  • William Kentridge; Forswearing Bad Company, from the Industry and Idleness series


Lot Estimate
ZAR 20 000 - 30 000
Selling Price
Incl. Buyer's Premium & VAT
ZAR 35 175

About this Item

South African 1955-
Forswearing Bad Company, from the Industry and Idleness series
signed, dated '87, numbered 21/30 in pencil in the margin, impressed with the Caversham Press chop mark, and inscribed with the title in the plate
hard ground etching, aquatint and drypoint
plate size: 29,5 by 25cm; 51 by 47 by 2,5cm including frame

Notes

"I worked on a series of prints based on William Hogarth's work [...] Industry and Idleness, this time set in Johannesburg. Hogarth's moral fable shows the industrious apprentice marrying his boss's daughter and ending up as Lord Mayor of London, whilst the idle apprentice falls prey to vice (he gambles in the churchyard) and ends up hanged at Tyburn. In the South Africa of the 1980s this moral equivalent did not seem to hold, and my series shows the industrious man still doomed by circumstances beyond him - in this case his class and his race - while someone in a different position, of different colour and privilege, ends up wealthy and successful despite his idleness [...]"

William Kentridge Prints, David Krut Publishing, Johannesburg, 2006, page 30

Literature

Bronwyn Law-Viljoen (ed). (2006) William Kentridge Prints, Johannesburg: David Krut Publishing. Illustrated on page 30.

Warren Siebrits, (2002) States of Emergence: South Africa 1960-1990, Johannesburg: Warren Siebrits Modern and Contemporary Art. Illustrated.

Michael Sittenfeld (ed). (2001) William Kentridge. Chicago: Museum of Contemporary Art; New York: New Museum of Contemporary Art in association with Harry N. Abrams, Inc., Publishers. Illustrated on page 77.

View all William Kentridge lots for sale in this auction


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