Y. Fongi
Y. Fongi , also Ypsilon Fongi , Yolanther Fongi , later Siddhartha Y Fongi , (born January 2, 1936 as Werner Gartung in Vechelde near Braunschweig ; † May 13, 2012 in Zschachenmühle ) was a versatile German avant-garde painter , draftsman , musician , object - and concept artist . In the 1960s an important representative of critical realism in art, pop art , conceptual art and Fluxus , he last lived in Zschachenmühle, Thuringia .
life and work
Y. Fongi attended various grammar schools until 1956 and was also a swimming and bathing attendant in Vechelde until 1955, also: employee in the construction of the Braunschweiger Zoo, member of the reptile research group " Salamander " in Essen and the cactus research in Buchloe , Jazzer in Frankfurt am Main , Heidelberg and Paris , namesake of the jazz magazine " Fongi ", as well as castle guide and hotel waiter on the Herreninsel Chiemsee , and finally aspiring landscape gardener. From 1963 Y. Fongi lived in Munich and Starnberg , worked temporarily as a garden architect in London and ran his own garden design company in Munich from 1964 to 1966.
Y. Fongi was a self-taught artist . His first oil painting was created in 1963. From 1966 he then created more extensive sculptures. He painted the first pictures in oil and ketchup and grew mold cultures on them . In addition, he created objects from a wide variety of materials (for example from old, worn out shoes or used suitcases), worked as a draftsman, painter and concept artist with various actions and happenings and had his first exhibition in the Munich gallery Rutzmoser in 1968 .
From 1969 Y. Fongi was a member of the artist collective Ten-Nine . The idea of Zehn-Neun was to market art in large numbers in order to be able to sell it at lower prices than the galleries. Ten-Nine wanted to make art cheaper so that it could reach more people. Other members of the artist group Zehn-Neun were (among others) Peter Ackermann , Peter Nagel and Dieter Asmus , KP Brehmer , Leiv Warren Donnan , Eduard Franoszek , Peter Sorge , Malte Sartorius , Siegfried Neuenhausen and Dieter Glasmacher . The cooperative art distribution was dissolved in 1977.
In 1972, Y. Fongi developed the concept of a “ Kontakteria ”, a café with a concept that he himself dubbed “ Contactism / Coffeeism ” as a new art movement : The “ Kontakteria ”, furnished with old upholstered furniture, should be a place for discussions where In addition to the consumption of coffee or " Fongi mushroom " beer, a paid awareness expansion was also acknowledged upon request . And as such a place of communication, a “ Kontakteria ” Fongis was to become part of the Kassel Documenta 5 in the same year , but was ultimately no longer realized as part of their framework due to differences of opinion with the exhibition management. Georg Jappe wrote: “The 1st Kontakteria Fongis was the attempt to find the total work of art. To raise awareness and contemplation, he invented and built the first fongilines, electronic stringed instruments. ... the Kontakteria is first and foremost a concept: a design for the total combination of as many human needs as possible, ... a permanent happening, but not a nebulous action. ... At Fongi we find one of the most radical expansions of the concept of art - and one of the most meaningful. "
In autumn 1975 Fongi withdrew from the art business, became an Osho-Sannyasin that same year and as such took on the name Siddhartha . In the spring of 1975 he founded his first Osho municipality in the Bavarian town of Margarethenried northeast of Munich, which was followed in 1982 by a second with 150 members in the Hessian castle Wolfsbrunnen , in 1986 another in Ovelgönne in Lower Saxony , and finally the fourth in the Thuringian Zschachenmühle in the early 1990s , where Siddhartha Y Fongi has been at home since then.
In 2009, after a break of almost 40 years, he was rediscovered by the Westerheide Gallery in Ranis , Thuringia , and was ready for the first time to go public with an exhibition of his sculptures, graphics and prints. In 2010 another exhibition of works by Fongi followed in his native Vechelde. In the last years of his life, Siddhartha Y Fongi worked in Zschachenmühle on his memoirs and their publication.
literature
- documenta 5th survey of reality - visual worlds today (exhibition catalog as a file folder, volume 1: material, volume 2: list of exhibits); Kassel 1972
- Jürgen Wichardt: Y. Fongi. The 1st Kontakteria ; in: Museum Folkwang Essen (ed.): Scene Rhein-Ruhr '72 (catalog); Essen 1972
- Klaus Staeck (Hrsg.): Questioning the Documenta or art should stay beautiful ; Göttingen 1972
- documenta archive (ed.): Resubmission d5 - A survey of the archive on documenta 1972 ; Kassel / Ostfildern 2001, ISBN 3-7757-1121-X
Web links
- Biographical and works
- Materials by and about Y. Fongi in the documenta archive
- Works by and about Y. Fongi in the German Digital Library
Individual evidence
- ↑ Galerie Westerheide: Y. (Ypsilon) Fongi ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Sabine Neubert: Old shoes and - a young heart ; In: Neues Deutschland (April 4, 2009) ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Michael Lieb: The magical world of Ypsilon Fongi ; In: Peiner Allgemeine Zeitung (June 12, 2009)
- ↑ mic: Weird art from high heels ; In: Peiner Allgemeine Zeitung (February 15, 2010)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Fongi, Y. |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Fongi, Yolanther; Fong, Ypsilon; Gartung, Werner (maiden name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German sculptor, draftsman, object and concept artist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | January 2, 1936 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Vechelde near Braunschweig |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 13, 2012 |
| Place of death | Zschachenmühle , Remptendorf community |