A Natural History of the Studio

In the book A Natural History of the Studio (2025), artist William Kentridge talks passionately about his way of working. This starts with creative procrastination: drinking tea, clearing up and making a list of ‘the lesser good ideas’. Sometimes, after much pacing around the work table, something worth pursuing emerges. This is how they come about, those spectacular works, such as the mobile shadow processions in Amsterdam, Rome, Cape Town and New York, among other places.

Kentridge’s descriptions of his family background are just as compelling. How his grandfather, Chain Kantorovich from Latvia, arrived in Johannesburg; how his father acted against apartheid as a judge. How William took his first steps to combine art and politics in an imaginative way, and how this eventually led to a studio of his own in Johannesburg with more than twenty co-workers. A Natural History of the Studio is not only a must-read for admirers of his art, but also a unique book about the creative process and the artist’s role. A Natural History of the Studio is published (in Dutch as Anatomie van het atelier) in the Netherlands by Uitgeverij Cossee.

With a Q&A moderated by Toef Jaeger (NRC), film clips and a screening of some of Kentridge's work on 35mm from the Eye collection.

The Dutch version of A Natural History of the Studio (2025) will be available at Eye and William Kentridge will be signing books after the event.