William Kentridge’s
The Great Yes, The Great No

William Kentridge, concept and director
Nhlanhla Mahlangu, associate director and choral composer
Phala O. Phala, associate director
Tlale Makhene, music director
Mwenya Kabwe, dramaturg

Internationally acclaimed for his visual art and theater productions, South African artist William Kentridge returns to campus with his latest creation for the stage, a chamber opera set on a 1941 sea voyage from Marseille to Martinique. Conceived in collaboration with theater maker Phala Ookeditse Phala and choral conductor and dancer Nhlanhla Mahlangu, The Great Yes, The Great No fictionalizes the historic wartime escape from Vichy France by, among others, the surrealist André Breton, the anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss, and the Cuban artist Wifredo Lam—and adds a distinguished and colorful cast of characters to the passenger list, like Aimé Césaire, Josephine Baker, Leon Trotsky, and Joseph Stalin.

In Kentridge’s hands, the ship becomes a fantastical menagerie of thinkers, makers, and revolutionaries in a production that merges surrealist imagery with real-life events, lush South African choral music, dance, poetry, and anti-rational approaches to language and image. Kentridge’s breathtaking visual inventiveness combines animated drawings, video projection, masks, shadow play, and bold sculptural costumes with spoken and projected text that explores the relationship between surrealism and the anticolonial Négritude movement.

The San Francisco Chronicle raved about SIBYL, Kentridge’s 2023 presentation at Cal Performances, so get your tickets now!

English translations will be projected on a backdrop screen.

Support for this performance is provided by The Great Yes, The Great No Council for Kentridge.
Lead Sponsor: Nadine Tang
Major Sponsors: Bob Ellis (March 15); Janice and Nicholas E. Brathwaite (March 15)
Sponsors: The Edgar Foster Daniels Foundation; Divesh & Diksha Makan
Commissioning support is provided by William and Sakurako Fisher.

Lead Commissioner: LUMA Foundation, Arles, France

Co-Commissioners: Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, Miami-Dade County, FL, with lead sponsor support from Adrienne Arsht; Cal Performances, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA; Centre D’art Battat, Montreal, Canada

Foundational commissioning support for the development and creation of The Great Yes, The Great No is provided by Brown Arts Institute at Brown University, Providence, RI

The Great Yes, The Great No acknowledges the kind assistance of Goodman Gallery, Lia Rumma Gallery, and Hauser & Wirth in this project.

Co-Producers: Les Théâtres de la Ville de Luxembourg, Luxembourg; Ruhrfestspiele Recklinghausen, Germany

This event is part of Cal Performances’ Illuminations: “Fractured History” programming for the 2024–25 season.