Fritz Wotruba citations (20 citations)

circa 1969
Quote of Wotruba in: 'Sculpture of Rotterdam', ed. Jan van Adrichem / Jelle Bouwhuis / Mariëtte Dulle, Center for the Art, 010 Publishers, Rotterdam, 2002, p. 198.

“Every magnitude, every dimension, requires a new configuration.”

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Fritz Wotruba

Source: The Human Form: Sculpture, Prints, and Drawings, 1977, p. 10.

“Our existence has a hectic quality. It is as though mobilization [circa 1937, the pre-war years in his country Austria] were imminent. Each one of us is suffering; we are all constantly worried as to how we are going through the next day. In spite of all this, we [Wotruba and his wife] have an unquenchable lust for life.”

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Fritz Wotruba

Source: The Human Form: Sculpture, Prints, and Drawings, 1977, p. 21.

“Measures, weights, proportions move and change in expression and meaning.”

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Fritz Wotruba

Source: The Human Form: Sculpture, Prints, and Drawings, 1977, p. 56.

“My desire to work is not stimulated by the classical proportions of Greek architecture, but by functional silos and hangars... The confusion of places, cluttered with art and culture chokes my inspiration. What stimulates and interests me is the natural noise of a busy city, and the practical lay-out of a harbor or factory which has come into being without consideration of any aesthetic principles.”

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Fritz Wotruba

Quote from 'Private Notebooks of Fritz Wotruba'; transl. Peter Foges & Haakon Chevalier – Neuchatel, Editions du Griffion, 1961.

“The power and force of stone reside in its mass, its weight, and its density.”

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Fritz Wotruba

Source: The Human Form: Sculpture, Prints, and Drawings, 1977, p. 19.

“The hardness and immobility of material gave me more satisfaction tan true-to-life representations.”

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Fritz Wotruba

Source: The Human Form: Sculpture, Prints, and Drawings, 1977, p. 9.

“Stone is the only true material for the sculptor. All others, tin, iron bars, tin cans and coiled springs are merely poor substitutes”

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Fritz Wotruba

Source: 'Sculpture of Rotterdam', ed. Jan van Adrichem / Jelle Bouwhuis / Mariëtte Dulle, Center for the Art, 010 Publishers, Rotterdam, 2002, p. 198.

“The sudden change [Wotruba and his wife returned to Vienna in December 1945, at the end of the war; there he started to direct a class for advanced students on the Akademie der Bildenden Künste of Vienna] has had a shock effect on me and on my work. The almost sensual excitement caused by the destruction around me wears off rather quickly. It is not my duty to give this past [of Nazism and the war-years, fh] more significance than it has already been given in literature, on the stage and in the cinema. I am concerned with the figure, with the statuary, i. e., with statics, measurement, equilibrium, and with unity.”

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Fritz Wotruba

Source: The Human Form: Sculpture, Prints, and Drawings, 1977, p. 22.

“Further working along the lines of experiments of 1954 [toward rounded forms and columnar figures], I executed the 'Figure with upraised arms' as the crucifix for a Parish church in Salzburg.”

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Fritz Wotruba

Source: The Human Form: Sculpture, Prints, and Drawings, 1977, p. 29.

“A good piece of art must combine barbarism and culture: two unique elements…”

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Fritz Wotruba

Source: The Human Form: Sculpture, Prints, and Drawings, 1977, p. 52.