Farewell Franz

The Baltimore Museum of Art's Franz West retrospective has closed and the work is now being packed away in crates marked FRAGILE. Fragile is a word that could be applied to the work itself, not only for the materials used to make it (papermache, cardboard, and plaster, among other things), but also for the feeling it evokes. West is an Austrian artist who grew up in the unsettled (and unsettling) atmosphere of post WWII Europe, a period which he describes as "a time of darkness". A sense of unease pervades the work, though it is not without a wonderfully dry and deadpan humor. With his pieces titled "Adaptives", West invites the viewer to experience the work in an unusual way. During the BMA's show, visitors could pick them up and try them on for size. Though they serve no specific utilitarian purpose, each adaptive offers the user the possibility of engaging physically with something usually off limits in museums: a work of art.
The show travels to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and will open there in March. An excellent catalog is available titled FRANZ WEST: To Build A House You Start With The Roof, Work 1972-2008, by Darsie Alexander.