3rd Sep, 2020 20:00
Modern & Contemporary Art
154
William Kentridge (South Africa 1955-)
Scribble Cat
sugarlift aquatint, spitbite aquatint and drypoint etching with
Sold for R739,700
Estimated at R650,000 - R800,000
sugarlift aquatint, spitbite aquatint and drypoint etching with
(1)
sheet size: 102 × 180 cm combined
Notes:
William Kentridge’s complex print, Scribble Cat, is offered alongside one of its major sources of inspiration Cecil Skotnes’ Cat, produced fifty years before that. In a reflection on his lifelong association with prints and printmaking at a printmaking conference held in Cape Town in 2003, William Kentridge gave a charming account of the significance of Cecil Skotnes’ print of a cat, given to him as a child and which hung in his bedroom. He demonstrated the deep affect of Skotnes’ cat on him by showing several images and clips in which a cat appears in his work. Scribble Cat is undoubtedly one of Kentridge’s most impressive cats. It followed an earlier sculpture of a cat on a revolving base, resembling the technology Kentridge employed in 2008 for works such as construction for Return (Tenor), devised for the commission for La Fenice, Venice’s historic opera house.Like drawings Kentridge was making at the time, in which multiple fragments are pieced together to make a whole, Scribble Cat takes the form of a puzzle of overlaid pages. The diverse printing techniques across the different pieces are unified by the cat, and “the tension between fragmentation and coherence gives the print its taut, feline energy”.Cats have featured significantly in the artist’s oeuvre. Over many years Kentridge has drawn, sculpted and printed cats; two spiky steel cats stand as guardians atop his entrance gate and another above his studio door. Perhaps his most memorable cat, featured in the 1999 film, Stereoscope, has all the electrifying energy of Scribble Cat.
Emma Bedford
Sources:
[i] Sue Williamson, https://artthrob.co.za/03sept/diary.html, accessed 31 July 2019.
[ii] https://davidkrutprojects.com/artworks/8908/scribble-ca
You can place an absentee bid through our website - please sign in to your account on our website to proceed.
In the My Account tab you can also enter telephone bids, or email bids@aspireart.net to log telephone/absentee bids.
Join us on the day of the auction to follow and bid in real-time.
The auction will be live-streamed with an audio-visual feed.
Auction: Modern & Contemporary Art, 3rd Sep, 2020
This Spring, Aspire Art Auctions broke new ground with a fresh, yet considered selection of artworks that is demographically more representative and reflects the spirit of current times. With a strong focus on South Africa, the sale also proudly represented artists from 10 African countries (Benin, DRC, Ghana, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Sudan, Togo, Uganda and Zimbabwe) and international artists from Europe, the UK and USA.
A great highlight was Edoardo Villa’s monumental steel sculpture titled Traverse from 1957 which achieved R4,893,400 – an auction record for the artist. Other exceptional offerings included works by Gerard Sekoto, George Pemba, Peter Clarke and Nicholas Hlobo.
IMPORTANT NOTICE:
Logistics
While we endeavour to assist our Clients as much as possible, we require artwork(s) to be delivered and/or collected from our premises by the Client. In instances where a Client is unable to deliver or collect artwork(s), Aspire staff is available to assist in this process by outsourcing the services to one of our preferred Service Providers. The cost for this will be for the Client’s account, with an additional Handling Fee of 15% charged on top of the Service Provider’s invoice.
Aspire Art provides inter-company transfer services for its Clients between Johannesburg and Cape Town branches. These are based on the size of the artwork(s), and charged as follows:
Small (≤60x90x10 cm): R480
Medium (≤90x120x15 cm): R960
Large (≤120x150x20 cm): R1,440
Over-size: Special quote
Should artwork(s) be collected or delivered to/from Clients by Aspire Art directly, the following charges will apply:
Collection/delivery ≤20km: R400
Collection/delivery 20km>R800≤50km
Collection/delivery >50km: Special quote
Packaging
A flat fee of R100 will be added to the invoice for packaging of unframed works on paper.
International Collectors Shipping Package
For collectors based outside South Africa who purchase regularly from Aspire Art’s auctions in South Africa, it does not make sense to ship artworks individually or per auction and pay shipping every time you buy another work. Consequently, we have developed a special collectors’ shipping package to assist in reducing shipping costs and the constant demands of logistics arrangements.
For buyers from outside South Africa, we will keep the artworks you have purchased in storage during the year and then ship all the works you have acquired during the year together, so the shipping costs are reduced. At the end of the annual period, we will source various quotes to get you the best price, and ship all your artworks to your desired address at once.
Aspire Art will arrange suitable storage during, and cost-effective shipping at the end, of the annual period.
Collections
Collections are by appointment, with 24-hours’ notice
Clients are requested to contact the relevant office and inform Aspire Art of which artwork(s) they would like to collect, and allow a 24-hour window for Aspire Art’s logistics department to retrieve the artwork(s) and prepare them for collection.
Handling Fee
Aspire Art charges a 15% Handling Fee on all Logistics, Framing, Restoration and Conservation arranged by Aspire.