16. Franz.Ost - shootingstar of the global art scene (asianonym)
"obserwaiting" at the Botanical Gardens Taipei
born 1968, Orchard Island, off Taiwan. Being an artist all his life,
Franz.Ost started art career coincidentally in 1987, when the 40-year-
old martial law was lifted. However, Franz.Ost is not a "political
artist" as most Chinese and Taiwanese artists who are making a big
fortune out of their socially critical works.
The name Franz comes from his original name "Faranto", it means "From
or about or of very old (far-) ancestors (-anto)", but also means
"the far future that speaks to the present us like an ancestor." Ost
or "Ohsto" refers to "the (Pacific) ocean" and "mute". A paradoxical
combination of opposite meanings, because the Pacific is constantly
roaring and shouting for the island people. But I think in a sense,
shouting can be mute.
titel for the planned solo-show for "LISTE 2000",
The Young Art Fair, Basel, Switzerland :
"when rabbitudes become form"
resume:
"These "things" are the eloquently awkward handiwork of the Taiwanese
artist Franz.East, and the dynamic he sets in motion between them and
the assortment of people engaged in these frozen pantomimes I will
call Ostkunst, or East-art, the art of living with art as if it were
the most ordinary of extraordinary realities. From this perspective,
East's sculpture is very much like a favorite book that one picks up
and puts down while moving around the house, and, walking away from
it one day, returns to the next day, or the following year, knowing
that it still holds mysteries. A fanciful book, then, and one that is
superficially unremarkable in perfect proportion to its intrinsic
oddity." (R.S., N.Y./Taipei 1997-99)
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