William Kentridge will discuss his chamber opera, The Great Yes, The Great No and related film To Cross One More Sea. The chamber opera reimagines the historical journey of the ship, the Capitaine Paul-Lemerle which sails for Martinique from Marseilles in 1941 with artists and intellectuals on board fleeing Vichy France, including surrealist André Breton, anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss, Cuban painter Wifredo Lam, communist novelist Victor Serge and exiled German author Anna Seghers. The production is part play, part Greek choir, part chamber opera – all interwoven with Kentridge’s breathtaking surrealist visuals.
