Peter Frantz
Peter Frantz was born in Tyrone, Pennsylvania and subsequently entered a large, eclectic, extended family of artists and musicians. He attended the University of Notre Dame studying engineering before subsequently matriculating at Goddard College, earning a degree in art and design and attained his Master of Fine Arts degree from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia. He has been a professional artist, writer and educator his entire adult life. From 2010 to 2014 he taught on the faculty of Towson University in Baltimore and has been an Artist In Education for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania for over 10 years.
He is the Founder and Executive Director of Fragile Peace, (www.fragilepeace.org) a non-profit organization engaged in using art, creativity, collaboration and education to work with at-risk populations to develop and empower small, indigenous, cross-cultural, interactive, creative problem-solving teams at home and abroad. Mr Frantz is also the co-founder and past Executive Director of Panzi Foundation USA (panzifoundation.org), a non-profit that addresses the conflict in the Congo and assists Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, Kivu Province, DR. Mr. Frantz is also the primary artist and curator for a continuing series of exhibitions presented by FragilePeace entitled: “Peace Should not be This Fragile".
As a practicing artist his paintings and drawings tend to have their origins in the thought processes behind his three-dimensional art which employs multiple man-made and natural materials, such as roots, trees, glass and cast bronze, in combination with video, light and sound to stress the use of art as means of discovery of the authenticity of personal identity and the stories and myths that we surround it with. His writings are autobiographical by nature and many are illustrated.
Artist Statement
I have been overtaken by a fable, but is it mine? We tell our stories, and they fill the sky with our art, our memories, our words, our thoughts and our dreams - the fundamental linkage to an age before and after. We bid goodbye to a part of ourselves by freeing intimacy with the knowledge that the transparency of telling will not return, but that is as it should be. This portrait of oneness may change with circumstance – though it underlies our myth.
I am exploring how our humanity emerges from the dissonance, working across various media including sculpture, painting, video, installation, geometry, concepts of human development, sounds, writing, even Morse code - it might be anything at this point - as I assemble the art interface, calling attention to the ever-present human condition. And, to answer this question for myself: do we create the myth as we go or do we adapt to the myth that has been written by us, perhaps even for us?