[ german ] With Terry Fox the artworld has lost one its best. Although his voice has not faded with his passing. I have been fortunate enough to have worked with Terry three times since 1996. A fourth project, already underway, is to remain unfinished due to Terry Fox' death. It was to be a special and very personal filmed tribute to the artist and the man, directed by the Austrian filmmaker Sabine Groschup. Terry Fox's legacy to Vienna, a city with a place in his heart since the end of the 1970s although he did not revisit for over thirty years, is his eight-channel soundtrack entitled 'Acousticks'. 'Acousticks' was produced in February 2008, during a month he enjoyed tremendously as TONSPUR Artist in Residence at quartier21 in the Museumsquartier Wien, where he was joined by his wife, the filmmaker and writer Marita Loosen. The world premier of the extremely intense sounding TONSPUR 23 was held on 24.2.08 in the TONSPUR_passage in the MQ Wien. 'Acousticks' could then be heard daily from 10am – 8pm at the same venue until 31.5.08. A personal note: 23 is my favourite number, and so for TONSPUR 23 I wanted to invite an artist whose work with sound I find particularly impressive. Having started as a painter, Terry Fox found his spiritual and creative home in the European Fluxus movement, and especially in the context of performance and Happenings. Terry Fox was impressive in every way: his thinking, his actions and his production. His artistic impact and oeuvre earns the greatest of respect and appreciation as a lifelong achievement. A great and comprehensive body of work that has now become his legacy, following his death, bears testimony to this. It must not be forgotten, and it is our task to ensure that it this does not happen. It is all too often too soon when people leave us — as did Terry Fox. He was only 65. Although things were a little different for Terry Alan Fox: Against all the odds, Terry Fox never stopped working. He understood how to adjust to his 'possibilities' as well as 'impossibilities. And so the 'known' and 'unknown' factors directly or indirectly became a part of his work. Presumably, because this work, complete with the necessity and directness of its production, approaches us so personally and intensely. "Dear Terry: Your work now substitutes your voice. Through this great body of work your voice will never fade among those who want to hear it and can!" Epilogue [Translation: Jonathan Quinn] Georg Weckwerth is artist, curator and artistic director of TONSPUR in the Museumsquartier Vienna |