Franz Erhard Walther

Franz Erhard Walther was born in Fulda, Germany, in 1939. He lives and works in Fulda.

Franz Erhard Walther is internationally recognized for his five-decade-long investigation into the spatial, sensorial, and temporal dimensions of forms. Since his first experiments during the early 1960s, Walther’s work has occupied a unique position in the development of post–World War II avant-garde practice, as he radically abandoned conventional modes of painting and sculpture in order to examine the process of art rather than its product.

Walther’s distinctive approach led him to conceiving objects and images that challenged the beholder to act. In acknowledging the impact of viewers’ presence and actions in real time and space, Walther attempts to suspend the sense of isolation and self absorption that is often associated with viewing art.

Perhaps his most iconic work, 1. Werksatz (First Work Set) consists of fifty-eight fabric elements or “instruments for processes” intended to be unfolded and used by viewers according to instructions concisely outlined in their individual titles. It invites visitors to become both beholder and participant — subject and object —and to engage in actions as individuals and with others, forging a conceptual and formal circle of implication.

— Courtesy Dia:Beacon

Available works

Exhibitions

Selected outdoor exhibitions

Documentation about Franz Erhard Walther

Franz Erhard Walther’s Biography (French)

Franz Erhard Walther’s Biography (English)

Frédéric Bonnet, « Dans les formes du langage », 2015 (French)

Emmanuelle Lequeux, « Vêtu de Walther, devenez un tableau vivant », 2015 (French)

Gerhard Mack, « Nomade mit leichtem Gepäck », 2013 (German)

Philippe Cuenat, Avant-Propos in « Abc… Museum, Wortbilder », 2004 (French)

Philippe Cuenat, Vorwort in « Abc… Museum, Wortbilder », 2004 (German)

Related artists