Felix in Exile

Felix in Exile is the fifth film in the Drawings for Projection series, which features the protagonist Soho Eckstein, the industrialist who is symbolic of the complicity between capital and apartheid in the exploitation of the black working classes, especially those employed on the mines. Soho’s nemesis, alter ego and the lover of Mrs Eckstein, is Felix Teitlebaum, who is always portrayed naked in the series.

In the previous film, Sobriety, Obesity and Growing Old, Soho renounces his industrial empire and Mrs Eckstein returns to him. As a result, Felix is now ‘in exile’, a state echoed in the images of the dead bodies in the streets after mass protests. Kentridge’s love story is also a compelling and insightful allegory for the death of apartheid.

Artwork courtesy of Artist and Goodman Gallery.