Producing a model usually serves as a scale for orientation, as an opportunity to categorise proportion and perspective, and as a method of estimating spatial components. One can also start out from those assumptions in the case of Franz West’s Hain, the model having been conceived of as “art in public space”. The work unites all the “typical” characteristics of a Franz West sculpture, such as the use of paper and plaster of Paris elements, the strong colouration or the metal trestles. However, what is completely atypical is the handling of volume. Where often huge bodies, Wulste, Querze and suchlike are formed, here one sees a delicate ensemble with a fragile appearance – one which is to be related to a meandering form that seems to have been fleetingly thrown down.

In its quiet execution, the vitrine is also reminiscent of Franz West’s graphic work, the expressive gestures combined with a certain fragility. Hain unites, as it were, raw, wild nature with tamed (civilised) contemplation. The acrylic glass cover reinforces the impression of a biosphere, a terrarium that – similar to Joseph Beuys’ work – protectively unifies humankind and nature.

Heike Maier, 2005 (translation: Tim Sharp)