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11/10/2008

Franz West / Dieter Roth & Rachel Harrison

Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore

The Baltimore Museum of Art has organized the first comprehensive survey in the United States of Franz West, an internationally acclaimed Austrian artist whose singular vision has resulted in one of the most remarkable bodies of work produced since the 1960s. On view at the BMA October 12, 2008 – January 4, 2009, Franz West, To Build a House You Start with the Roof: Work, 1972‐2008 includes 117 objects that reflect West’s extraordinary innovations in sculpture, design, and on paper—ranging from early interactive works from the 1970s to two enormous brightly colored objects created for this exhibition. Admission is free.

Known for his intriguing sculptures, provocative collages, and giant outdoor installations, Franz West (b. 1947) has played a critical role in redefining the possibilities of sculpture as a social and environmental experience for the past three decades. His manipulation of found materials, papier‐mâché, and furniture is unlike any other in appearance and application. Though fundamentally sculptural in its construction, his work veers towards the biomorphic and prosthetic, mines the intellectualism of Freud and Wittgenstein, and possesses a sly wit and awkward beauty that speaks with equal fluency to the aesthetics of painterly abstraction and trash art.

Franz West, To Build a House You Start with the Roof features rarely seen examples of West’s work drawn from European and American museums and galleries as well as private collections. The exhibition is organized as a series of mini‐ installations that invite visitors to encounter and occasionally touch a range of objects. Beginning in September, three of West’s candy‐colored sculptures will greet visitors outside of the Museum. These colorful organic forms include Dorit (2002), a 20‐foot tall column with four round orbs like pink gumballs on a pole, and Swimmer (2005) and Violetta. To the song of Gerhard Rühm: I like to rest on aquatic corpses (2005)―both recent additions to the BMA’s collection. Inside the Museum, the exhibition begins with two 25‐foot tall aluminum sculptures making their debut in Baltimore. These oversize looping objects titled The Ego and The Id (2008) offer a place for visitors to take a seat and become part of the art. Subsequent rooms include cabinets, tables, and chairs that infuse the art environment with the culture of bars, cafés, and domestic life (1990s), a large room with papier‐mâché groupings and an installation of free‐standing sculptures; and a gallery of stand‐alone works that are as beautiful as they are precarious‐looking (1980‐1990s). In the final Adaptives section (1970s), visitors can handle select human‐scaled plaster sculptures in a space tinged by the crimson hue of West’s floor lamps. Throughout the exhibition, groupings of West’s collages show the often cheeky and humorous influences of mass media, comic books, pop culture, and advertising.

INACTIVITY CENTER In a gallery adjacent to the exhibition, an Inactivity Center inspired by West’s themes of leisure and relaxation will offer visitors a place to sit down and reflect on the artist’s work, read newspapers and magazines, or express their thoughts using word magnets to create poetry or prose. There will also be a telephone for curious visitors to “Dial a Curator,” select questions from a menu, and listen to pre‐recorded answers. Examples of questions are: “What does the title mean?” or “How does West create his sculptures?” On weekends, art interpreters called “Friends of Franz” will be available at select times to introduce people to West’s work and demystify the often baffling world of contemporary art.

CATALOGUE A fully illustrated catalogue by Darsie Alexander, BMA Senior Curator of Contemporary Art mixes intense visual content with critical commentary, an interview with the artist, a section on West’s working methods, an artist’s response to the work through words and images, and an extensive biography and chronology. Essay contributors are Tom Eccles, Executive Director of the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College; Rachel Harrison, an artist who lives and works in New York City; and Eric Banks, former Editor‐in‐Chief of Bookforum. Co‐published with MIT Press. Hardcover 288 pages, 168 color illustrations. On sale at The BMA Shop for $44.95.

Image: Friedl Kubelka. Franz West with Picture Object (Guitar). 1974. Copyrigh Friedl Kubelka

The exhibition travels to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art March 15 – June 7, 2009.

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Front Room: Dieter Roth & Rachel Harrison

Chocolate, cheese, and fried dumplings aren’t what you would usually expect as the subjects for museum­worthy artworks, yet in its upcoming Front Room exhibition the BMA features two artists who manage to do just that. On view from October 12, 2008 to January 4, 2009, the BMA’s experimental project space pairs the work of Dieter Roth (German, 1930­1998) and Rachel Harrison (American, b.1966) to coincide with the opening of the exhibition Franz West, To Build a House You Start with the Roof. Separated by generations and continents, Roth and Harrison overlap both formally and conceptually in approximately 15 two­ and three­dimensional artworks from the BMA’s collection that expose their shared sensibilities.

Both Roth and Harrison use the stuff from everyday life, ranging from food items to daily cast­offs to bric­ a­brac and magazine pictures, to grapple with issues of decay and impermanence. Roth takes a simple postcard and transforms it into a glittery pastiche of images that embrace the abstract as well as the photographic. Harrison, whose work was featured in the Whitney Biennial 2008, fashions three­ dimensional forms that range from the bulbous to the architectonic. Rachel Harrison is a contributor to the Franz West exhibition catalogue and Roth was both a friend of West’s and a participant in the art scene of Vienna, where West still resides.

Front Room: Dieter Roth & Rachel Harrison is curated by Darsie Alexander, BMA Senior Curator of Contemporary Art.

Docent­led Tours
Wednesdays, October 22 and November 19 at 2 p.m.
Enjoy an informative tour of Front Room: Dieter Roth & Rachel Harrison and learn about the inspiration behind the artworks and the artists’ relationship with Franz West.

Media Contacts: Anne Mannix (amannix@artbma.org) or Kelly Linton (klinton@artbma.org) 443‐573‐1870

The Baltimore Museum of Art BMA is located on Art Museum Drive at North Charles and 31st Streets, three miles north of Baltimore’s Inner Harbor.
The BMA is open Wednesday through Friday, 11 a.m.– 5 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, 11 a.m. – 6 p.m. The Museum is closed Monday, Tuesday, New Year’s Day, July 4, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.
General admission to the BMA is free. Special events and exhibitions may be ticketed.

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