Willem de Kooning 'Gotham News', 1955
Tension is created when objects work agaisnt each other. This give and take is part of the creative process and is very evident in the work of Abstract Expressionist William De Kooning. It is 1950's America and the sound of Jazz is in the air. Like Jazz the work of the Abstract expressionist is very gestural and free. De Kooning would make a gestural mark on the canvas and that inturn would suggest his next mark. It is back and forth like a game of chess untill the painting starts taking shape. As well as adding paint he would remove it, smear it, scrap it and all these actions would become part of the work. He would even use newpaper to help dry the paint - like in this piece 'Gothis News'. Parts of the news print have been caught in the panit adding to the overall effect. The creative give and take process is central to this work.
William Kentridge. 'MUSIC BOX TONDO', 2006
William Kentridge makes contemporary animations by repeatedly erasing and reworking charcoal drawings on the same piece of paper to create stop-motion animated films. He does not make a story board but makes the animations as he goes. Kentridge sees it as a physical exercise - walking back and forth between the camera and the paper gives him time to improvise with the animation.
Robin Rhode is a contemporary South African artist who creates sequences of images that tell a story. He works directly onto walls or the ground and draws, erases, redraws the sections of the sequence. They have a similar feel to Muybridges work, and like a Muybridge they are primarily designed to be presents as a sequence of images and not an animation.
His earliest works were public performance pieces, often without an audience, staged on the streets of Johannesburg. In 1998, Rhode began documenting these works, which he calls “performative drawings” by taking still photographs that he would later compile into halting video animations that had the texture of flip books. In 2002, after moving to Berlin, Rhode shifted his practice from the urban streets into the contained space of his studio. This allowed for, as he describes, “a distance, an increased desire to take a more analytical position in the formation of ideas outside of the politically and socially charged environment of South Africa.". He has more to do with performance art and graffiti than photography - even though his work is displayed as photographs. In this sense his work is similar to Andy Goldsworthy.
