Katharina Fritsch

Place: Essen

Born: 1956

Biography:

Katharina Fritsch is a German sculptor born on February 14, 1956, in Essen, West Germany. She lives and works in Düsseldorf, Germany. Fritsch first studied history and art history at the University of Münster and later transferred to Kunstakademie Düsseldorf where she was a student of Fritz Schwegler until 1984. She is known for her sculptures and installations that reinvigorate familiar objects with a jarring and uncanny sensibility. Her works' iconography is drawn from many different sources, including Christianity, art history, and folklore. Fritsch attracted international attention for the first time in the mid-1980s with life-size works such as a true-to-scale elephant along with replicas of everyday objects like a large display stand filled with statues of Madonna. Her art is often concerned with the psychology and expectations of visitors to a museum.