William Kentridge & Philip Miller | Breathe Dissolve Return | MAXXI
29 January – 6 April 2026
MAXXI – Museo Nazionale delle Arti del XXI Secolo presents Breathe Dissolve Return, a major project by South African artist William Kentridge and composer Philip Miller.
Kentridge, internationally acclaimed for his charcoal drawings, films, and theatrical productions, here joins forces with Miller — his long-standing collaborator — to create an immersive environment in which drawing, animation, music, and voice interweave. The project takes the form of a meditative landscape where the acts of breathing, dissolving, and returning become both aesthetic gestures and philosophical propositions.
Rooted in the tradition of South African storytelling and resistance, the work unfolds across MAXXI’s monumental spaces as a continuous meditation on time, memory, and the fragility of human presence. Kentridge’s characteristic ledger drawings — marks made and erased, figures appearing and disappearing — trace the invisible histories inscribed in bodies and places.
Breathe Dissolve Return is part of MAXXI’s broader programme of research into the intersections of visual art and performance, presenting Kentridge’s practice in a new and expanded form.