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Katharina Fritsch’s sculpture often begins with an archetypal image, which she subverts with shifts in scale and color. Madonnenfigur / Madonna (1987) is based on a small statuette of the Virgin Mar
y that Fritsch enlarged to her own height and painted a vibrant yellow. Other sculptures depict life-size figures as different characters and types, all male, including a chef, a giant, and an art dealer. But Fritsch is perhaps best known for her uncanny animal sculptures. Rattenkönig / Rat-King (1993) is a circle of sixteen gigantic rats, each nearly ten feet tall, with their tails tied in a massive knot at the center. Art historian Jean-Pierre Criqui has said of Fritsch’s animal sculptures,
