EVENT LANGUAGE: GERMAN

Curator’s talk: Cornelia Offergeld, artistic director KÖR Kunst im öffentlichen Raum Wien, in conversation with Ines Turian, CEO of Franz West Werknutzungs Ges.m.b.H., at the sculpture group.

Afterwards: Tour of the foundation / former Franz West studio.

Franz West (1947-2012), one of Austria’s most internationally acclaimed artists, worked in Vienna throughout his whole life. His studios have been located in Vienna’s third district since the 1990s, most recently for many years on Esteplatz. Since 2022, one of his sculpture groups has been installed on this square – as a collaboration between the Franz West Privatstiftung and KÖR Kunst im öffentlichen Raum Wien.

The ensemble, made of epoxy resin, is untitled. Franz West did not specify a fixed arrangement of the five sculptures. Thus, the artist Heimo Zobernig was asked to define their placement on Esteplatz. The installation was built posthumously in 2012 based on a 1:10 model by the artist’s assistants and shown for the first time in 2013 in a group exhibition in City Hall Park in Manhattan, New York.

The large-scale outdoor works created since 1996 are an important part of West’s oeuvre. By choosing bright, vibrant colors, he contrasted the objects with nature and urban space, and often defined the ground, whether rural or urban, as the base for his sculptures. The fact that they seem to grow out of the ground is already part of the artistic concept.

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