Franz West was born in Vienne in Austria in 1947. He began his career in mid-1960s and his earliest pieces were a reaction to the displays of radical public behavior by certain artists of the time - West made a series of small, portable plaster sculptures which were only completed as artworks when the viewer picked them up and carried them off. Later work builds on these early ideas, large metal sculptures are overgrown versions of these early pieces. Installations, in art galleries and museums, offer the viewer the chance to relax on a work of art whilst admiring other pieces. West has now been exhibited internationally for more than three decades in galleries and museums.

Above: Franz West, The left horn of Moses, 2004