Between Two Senses: Franz West's Invitation To Look And Touch
His first major retrospective in France at Centre Pompidou, Paris, reveals the artists's ongoing dialogue between the visible and the haptic
A retrospective of Austrian artist Franz West at the Centre Pompidou in Paris begins where most biographical tales perhaps should – with his mother, Emilie West. Born to a well-to-do Viennese Jewish family, she espoused communist ideals and the artist’s father, Ferdinand Zokan, a Serbian coal merchant. The family lived in a public housing complex, out of which Emilie ran a private dental practice. Her clients included many artists and poets, among them Reinhard Priessnitz, a poet and theorist who would give the name Paßstücke (Adaptives) to West’s most iconic series of sculptures. This early contact with Vienna’s artistic milieu would have a profound impact on the young West’s later career, as would the sounds of whirling drills and the image of his mother creating white and pink moulds of teeth from plaster and resin.
Including 180 works made between 1972 and 2012, the exhibition is not only the first major retrospective of West’s work to be shown in France but also one of the largest and most comprehensive. At its spiritual and narrative heart are the ‘Paßstücke’ (1973–2010): sculptures consisting of a minimal steel skeleton dressed somewhat haphazardly with painted plaster. Derived from the German verb anpassen (to adapt), the ‘Paßstücke’ were named for their ability to seemingly accommodate the body of whoever handled them. Seeing the unique way that each person held, manipulated and even wore the sculptures, Priessnitz believed that these works could give form to individual neuroses.
