Peter Zizka

celebrations of 25 years German reunification, typographic Installation of Peter Zizka on the St. Paul's Church, Frankfurt

Peter Zizka (born December 16, 1961) is a German conceptual artist and designer.

Life

Zizka initially trained as an art restorer. In 1983, he went on to study graphics, design, and visual communication at the Hochschule für Gestaltung Offenbach. At the same time, he attended the Städelschule in Frankfurt and studied under Bruce McLean, among others.

Zizka founded the MEMORY conceptual art group together with Olaf Rahlwes. MEMORY's international exhibitions explored the interface between art and design in the early 1990s.

After leaving MEMORY, Zizka worked on design projects that were socially relevant. In his work, Zizka adopts a less agitative position than that of a communication guerrilla or an adbuster such as Banksy. The most well known of his work from this series is The Virtual Minefield,^[1] the first floor-based installation spanning art and design. Zizka won the gold award from the European Art Directors Club for The Virtual Minefield. It was shown at the Kunsthal Rotterdam, the Foreign Office in Berlin and the Hygiene Museum Dresden among others.

In 2008, Zizka won the design competition for the Kieler Woche Festival, following the likes of Wim Crouwel (1998), Fons Hickmann (2002), and Klaus Hesse (2006).

2010 he starts an art Project in Burundi to render weapons of the Hutu Tutsi conflict harmless in real terms and at the same time initiate a process, by means of aesthetisation, which is relevant to society to make the discussion on the issue of small arms tangible on a broad communication level

2011 he received the fellowship of the Deutsche Akademie Rom Villa Massimo

2014 he writes about design for the Swiss Bilanz magazine, since 2015 he works also as a freelance curator for the Museum für angewandte Kunst Frankfurt

Memberships

Since 2009, Zizka is a board member of the German Designers Club.

Bibliography

• Memory 30 - a book, Walther König: Frankfurt
• ROGUE, Konstantin Adamopoulos: MEMORY, a sign of intelligence
• Page Designmagazin 10/95 a perfect triangle, Page Verlag
• FrancoForte, Verlag: Schaden u. Schaden ISBN 3-932187-31-8
• Horizont 18/2002 colors of taste
• Horizont 23/2002 Das Werkzeug als Auge sensibler Stars
• Welt am Sonntag, 24. November 2002 Objektive Schönheit
• TAZ, 2. Dezember 2004 Der falsche Tritt kann tödlich sein
• Gestalte / Create - Design Medien Kunst, Hrsg. v. Bernd Kracke 2007,HFG of–main, Wir die Kommunikationannimateure ISBN 3-89986-092-6
• Hundert t-Variationen, editor Jan Teunen, Verlag Hermann Schmidt Mainz, ISBN 3-87439-544-8
• form 213, Hasta la Vista Baby!, Verlag Form ISBN 3-936560-50-1
• Padamm, Verlag otto Lembeck, die Zweiweltenoper, ISBN 978-3-87476-520-6
• Design Walk, Psyrri, Greek Graphic Designers Association
• Page Designmagzine 06/07 Wertvolles Dazwischen, Page Verlag
• Form 219/2008 "Peter Zizkas Graphic blows" ISBN 3-7643-8615-0
• Beef 03/2008 (interview) Designer geben den Takt vor ISSN 1866-1890
• Lookbook 2.0 2009 Simple, Multiple
• Designing the Brand Experience, ISBN 981-245-732-1
• Revision 1/2009 "Design-lotto easy going"

Works

• MEMORY 1-24
• Der Frankfurter Bankstuhlgang (performance)
• Bois de Boulogne (fotoinstallation)
• The Virtual Minefield (installation)
• IPRAY (2006)
• Outliner (2008, installation)
• Symbiosis/Burundi (2010/11, installation) constructed from weapons which have been rendered unusable ^[2]

Awards

• ADC Germany (seven times)
• ADC Europe (three times)
• DDC Germany (19 times)
• IF communication award (24 times)
• TDC New York (five times)

References

External links

• Kunsthal Rotterdam
• medico international anti landmine campaign
• Workshop Vitra Design Museum
• Interview of Deutschen Designer Clubs with P.Zizka
• talk with Stefan Sagmeister at the KISD
• Projectpage of Symbiosis/Burundi