0:00:01.360,0:00:08.552
(ambient electronic music)

0:00:08.552,0:00:17.212
(tapping bowl)

0:00:17.212,0:00:20.380
Every human being should know what the sun[br]is,

0:00:20.380,0:00:23.720
and I don't have to explain to somebody what[br]the sun is,

0:00:23.720,0:00:27.818
and I don't want to explain to somebody what[br]pollen is.

0:00:29.862,0:00:37.119
That is something which I sifted it there[br]to enjoy it and share it with many people,

0:00:37.119,0:00:42.000
but it's not my task to explain this.

0:00:43.622,0:00:50.241
That is the secret and the beauty[br]and the power and the potential of all this.

0:00:50.241,0:00:52.842
(tapping sifter)

0:00:52.842,0:00:58.800
For me, the pollen is the beginning[br]of the life of the plants and not less.

0:00:59.176,0:01:04.820
The pollen has an incredible color,[br]but it's not a pigment for a painting.

0:01:05.454,0:01:12.136
All the pollen I collect is in the close vicinity[br]of the village where we live in southern Germany.

0:01:15.895,0:01:18.689
And the most beautiful is the dandelion pollen.

0:01:19.112,0:01:22.990
When you sit days and days in a dandelion[br]meadow,

0:01:22.990,0:01:26.190
it's an incredible experience.

0:01:26.449,0:01:31.298
And it's something totally different[br]than what our society thinks

0:01:31.298,0:01:36.800
of what you should do or what you should achieve[br]in an hour or in a day or in a week or in

0:01:36.800,0:01:37.952
a month.

0:01:37.952,0:01:42.970
(tapping sifter)

0:01:46.212,0:01:50.380
The pollen piece at MOMA was pollen from hazelnut.

0:01:50.380,0:01:52.780
They blossom in very early spring.

0:01:52.780,0:01:57.589
For one month about, I can collect one jar[br]of pollen.

0:01:58.458,0:02:04.760
The pollen which was here at MOMA[br]was from the early '90s to last year.

0:02:04.760,0:02:06.289
(tapping sifter)

0:02:06.289,0:02:10.014
It's about 15 to 18 seasons.

0:02:12.267,0:02:15.557
This was by far the biggest pollen piece I[br]ever made.

0:02:16.779,0:02:21.534
The other pollen pieces I made[br]were like one-quarter of this piece.

0:02:26.444,0:02:30.420
My father worked as a doctor[br]in a small town in southern Germany.

0:02:31.031,0:02:34.810
There was this one friend, Jakob Braeckle[br]is his name,

0:02:34.810,0:02:38.201
who was this artist from a local town.

0:02:39.426,0:02:42.360
He was the only friend of my parents.

0:02:42.360,0:02:50.080
He showed my parents many things[br]which somehow became very important

0:02:50.080,0:02:52.502
for our family and for myself.

0:02:52.760,0:02:55.540
And I think this glass house which my parents[br]built

0:02:55.540,0:02:57.830
and which we are still living in

0:02:57.830,0:03:00.680
somehow wouldn't have been possible without[br]him.

0:03:01.361,0:03:04.510
We had an incredible, beautiful relationship.

0:03:05.379,0:03:10.360
I think the main influence was[br]he was very interested in Chinese philosophy

0:03:10.360,0:03:13.950
and Laozi and Brancusi.

0:03:16.933,0:03:22.330
When I was 15, I could remember by heart[br]all chapters of the Tao Te Ching.

0:03:22.330,0:03:26.932
My favorite chapter was one, number one, and[br]number 25.

0:03:29.610,0:03:35.280
This exhibition at Sperone Westwater,[br]the space is a very difficult space.

0:03:35.280,0:03:37.110
It's not an easy space.

0:03:37.110,0:03:39.312
It's a very interesting space.

0:03:39.853,0:03:46.890
I think I found a very beautiful solution,[br]to use two floors with an old work, with beeswax

0:03:46.890,0:03:48.050
ziggurats,

0:03:48.050,0:03:52.762
and then combine it with new work,[br]with all these brass ships.

0:03:54.266,0:03:58.901
This installation was for me the first time[br]I did something like this.

0:04:01.297,0:04:06.759
Test the integrity of all this, it's like[br]one piece.

0:04:07.816,0:04:12.740
My beeswax step pyramids which I made,[br]I give the title Ziggurat,

0:04:12.740,0:04:16.109
which refers to Mesopotamian step pyramids.

0:04:17.566,0:04:24.000
For me, it was always very beautiful[br]that you can do something today in the 21st

0:04:24.000,0:04:25.000
century

0:04:25.000,0:04:29.644
which is not an imitation[br]but which has a connection to art which is

0:04:29.644,0:04:32.200
4,000 years old.

0:04:40.855,0:04:44.009
Question: what is the boats actually made[br]out of?

0:04:44.009,0:04:45.332
— Brass.[br]— Brass?

0:04:45.332,0:04:45.832
— Brass, yeah.

0:04:46.332,0:04:47.608
They actually brass boats?

0:04:47.608,0:04:48.766
Brass, yeah.

0:04:49.024,0:04:49.670
Okay.

0:04:50.707,0:04:51.207
All right.

0:04:51.230,0:04:52.740
Very simple brass.

0:04:52.740,0:04:54.513
Right, right, right, right.

0:04:54.513,0:04:55.630
Even the tips?

0:04:55.630,0:04:57.570
Even like even like the tip?

0:04:57.570,0:05:00.172
Yeah, yeah, it's one piece which I just folded.

0:05:00.172,0:05:00.672
Oh, okay.

0:05:00.672,0:05:01.672
It's not welded, nothing.

0:05:01.836,0:05:03.376
Just like paper folding.

0:05:03.612,0:05:04.612
Ah, got you.

0:05:04.870,0:05:07.773
Oh, how did you get the brass to bend like[br]that?

0:05:07.773,0:05:09.172
Yeah, I did that.

0:05:09.172,0:05:09.672
You did it?

0:05:09.672,0:05:12.000
Yeah, I made all the ships myself.

0:05:12.000,0:05:13.369
Ah, got you.

0:05:14.000,0:05:18.120
Once in in high school, I wrote like a 10-page[br]thing.

0:05:18.120,0:05:21.670
It's about Brancusi, and it was about Laozi.

0:05:21.670,0:05:25.240
And the teacher came, and in front of the[br]whole class,

0:05:25.240,0:05:27.750
he said, "Wolfgang, you really cheat.

0:05:27.750,0:05:30.810
You had the Laozi lying there under your table.

0:05:30.810,0:05:32.627
I don't believe this."

0:05:33.426,0:05:38.740
And then I got really upset,[br]and then he said, "And who is this Brancusi?

0:05:38.740,0:05:41.030
I don't know who this is."

0:05:41.030,0:05:42.030
(chuckles)

0:05:42.030,0:05:43.030
"Who is this?

0:05:43.030,0:05:45.130
I never heard about this man."

0:05:45.130,0:05:52.360
And then I then I stood up[br]and somehow by heart, in front of the whole

0:05:52.360,0:05:53.380
class,

0:05:53.380,0:05:56.721
I recited the whole chapters out loud.

0:05:56.721,0:05:58.656
I got so emotional.

0:05:58.961,0:06:03.800
When I look back, it was already this very[br]strong strive

0:06:03.800,0:06:06.000
for something totally different.

0:06:11.403,0:06:17.026
Pollen is far from the other works,[br]but still, I feel in such a major exhibition,

0:06:17.026,0:06:18.068
in a gallery,

0:06:18.232,0:06:22.425
it's very beautiful to have the shelf of pollen[br]jars there.

0:06:25.926,0:06:27.880
So this is beech.

0:06:27.880,0:06:28.880
This is pine.

0:06:28.880,0:06:32.248
This is hazelnut, the same which is now at[br]MOMA.

0:06:32.248,0:06:34.120
And this is from moss, a very fine...

0:06:36.846,0:06:39.137
It's an extremely fine...

0:06:42.262,0:06:46.721
It's nearly like a liquid, so fine, it really[br]falls.

0:06:48.295,0:06:49.223
It's also very good.

0:06:49.223,0:06:50.516
Smell it.

0:06:52.935,0:06:56.610
Yeah, my father had this incredible interest[br]in art,

0:06:56.610,0:07:01.614
and then, towards his midlife, it was a real[br]crisis for him.

0:07:01.614,0:07:07.561
He had begun to paint[br]and made really very beautiful white paintings.

0:07:07.936,0:07:11.720
But then for him, of course,[br]it was impossible to become an artist,

0:07:11.720,0:07:14.619
so there was a real tension.

0:07:15.112,0:07:25.114
And for myself, I was then a teenager,[br]and not like a normal teenager who would oppose

0:07:25.114,0:07:26.502
his parents.

0:07:26.502,0:07:30.465
I was following everything what my parents[br]did.

0:07:33.660,0:07:37.030
I think we only lived three years in this[br]glass house,

0:07:37.030,0:07:40.182
and then there was this travel to Turkey.

0:07:40.182,0:07:44.180
People in small villages invited us into their[br]homes,

0:07:44.180,0:07:48.846
simple houses with rooms totally empty, with[br]some pillows,

0:07:48.846,0:07:52.834
and my parents came home, and all the furniture[br]disappeared.

0:07:54.619,0:07:59.169
The main thing was that we wanted to have[br]only the art

0:07:59.169,0:08:03.699
in a space and not to be disturbed by anything[br]else.

0:08:03.699,0:08:08.270
The beginning of the '60s,[br]my father saw these books about Indian tantric

0:08:08.270,0:08:08.911
art.

0:08:10.626,0:08:15.769
He was somehow so struck by the drawings,[br]which looked like a Mondrian, but were like

0:08:15.769,0:08:17.199
400 years old.

0:08:17.199,0:08:21.818
And then he said, "I want to see this country[br]where this is coming from."

0:08:21.983,0:08:26.919
And this was actually the reason[br]for the first travel to India of my parents.

0:08:26.919,0:08:32.071
And we, my sister and I, we were like 15 years[br]old.

0:08:35.289,0:08:37.064
India is overwhelming.

0:08:37.064,0:08:39.410
I mean, it's for everybody overwhelming.

0:08:40.044,0:08:45.168
And I remember the first night in Delhi,[br]we arrived like five o'clock, and then we

0:08:45.168,0:08:46.518
took a walk.

0:08:46.870,0:08:49.160
You could not walk on the sidewalk.

0:08:49.160,0:08:53.270
It was people were lying there, like one after[br]the next.

0:08:53.270,0:08:55.540
It looked like a cemetery.

0:08:59.534,0:09:02.555
My parents began to weep.

0:09:03.354,0:09:08.380
So it was a real emotional experience on every[br]level

0:09:08.380,0:09:12.810
and then seeing all this artworks and all[br]this architecture

0:09:12.810,0:09:17.970
but also the human existence, which was even[br]much more...

0:09:20.507,0:09:23.790
It was the deepest experience, I think.

0:09:24.330,0:09:28.720
My parents began to support a village in south[br]India.

0:09:28.720,0:09:32.274
I have this studio now there some years.

0:09:35.094,0:09:40.075
People always think that I became a Buddhist,[br]which is not true at all.

0:09:40.380,0:09:44.018
I chose not to enter a monastery.

0:09:44.183,0:09:48.741
I became an artist,[br]and art is about not knowing where you are

0:09:48.741,0:09:49.831
going.

0:09:49.831,0:09:52.890
(tapping tub)

0:09:52.890,0:09:56.500
I was very interested in art when I was in[br]high school.

0:09:57.111,0:10:02.019
For me, artists were like semi-gods,[br]and when I met then some artists

0:10:02.019,0:10:08.220
and it was for me such a shock (laughs)[br]and to the other way that I began to study

0:10:08.220,0:10:09.009
medicine

0:10:09.009,0:10:15.407
with all the ideals you can have as a doctor,[br]to save mankind and humanity.

0:10:18.179,0:10:21.860
In German university, you can go to any lecture[br]you want,

0:10:21.860,0:10:26.320
so I went to philosophy and psychology and[br]psychiatry,

0:10:26.320,0:10:28.590
and I was searching, searching.

0:10:28.590,0:10:32.312
I couldn't imagine to go write a thesis in[br]a lab.

0:10:32.312,0:10:36.880
Then I found a professor who said,[br]"If you have really a good idea

0:10:36.880,0:10:39.250
which is totally independent."

0:10:39.250,0:10:44.364
Then I asked him if I could write a thesis[br]on the hygiene of drinking water in south India,

0:10:44.364,0:10:48.528
which would give me a total freedom[br]from all this kind of thing.

0:10:48.739,0:10:49.940
And he said, "Go ahead.

0:10:49.940,0:10:52.652
If you do it well, there's no problem."

0:10:53.474,0:10:54.589
And that's what I did.

0:10:54.589,0:11:00.029
And then I went to all these villages[br]around the village which my parents supported

0:11:00.029,0:11:03.640
and stayed there for half a year.

0:11:03.640,0:11:11.523
And that was somehow when I came back,[br]it was such a intense experience that I...

0:11:11.523,0:11:16.589
And I began to carve this brahmanda, this[br]egg.

0:11:18.492,0:11:23.300
"Brahmanda" means "the egg of Brahma,"[br]so it's like a universal egg.

0:11:23.300,0:11:27.070
The beginning of the universe, that was the[br]idea.

0:11:27.070,0:11:30.422
I made this work in 1972.

0:11:31.526,0:11:35.250
This was a boulder from nearby, from a quarry.

0:11:35.250,0:11:40.820
It's a very hard stone, and I worked here[br]on top of this small hill near the forest

0:11:40.820,0:11:41.820
for three months.

0:11:42.407,0:11:48.010
It was a very intense time,[br]thinking of what I want to do with my life.

0:11:48.362,0:11:51.793
Finally, when it was finished, just before[br]Christmas,

0:11:51.793,0:11:54.902
everybody thought I would never come back[br]to the university.

0:11:55.912,0:11:58.876
All my friends, they called, and,[br]"Where is Wolfgang?

0:11:58.876,0:11:59.876
What is he doing?"

0:12:00.204,0:12:04.400
Finally, when this was finished,[br]I said to myself and to my parents

0:12:04.400,0:12:07.500
that I would not become a doctor.

0:12:07.500,0:12:10.192
I really wanted to become an artist.

0:12:11.837,0:12:16.734
But I would finish my medical studies,[br]which would take another two years.

0:12:17.935,0:12:24.228
From 1972 until '74,[br]when I then finally left the university,

0:12:24.439,0:12:32.534
these two years were so important for me,[br]was, I think, the most difficult time in my life,

0:12:32.534,0:12:38.400
where all this tension built up,[br]and then, only like half a year later,

0:12:38.400,0:12:40.831
I made the first milkstone.

0:12:42.241,0:12:46.451
(milk pouring)

0:13:16.740,0:13:22.566
The first milkstone was the direct answer[br]to what I had seen at the university and in

0:13:22.566,0:13:24.000
the hospitals.

0:13:33.760,0:13:37.906
I'm still amazed that I could give such a[br]direct answer

0:13:37.906,0:13:39.930
with such an artwork.

0:13:41.175,0:13:47.168
How temporary milk is and how [br]eternal a stone is.

0:13:54.873,0:14:00.079
Art is, for me, also that it can have these[br]connections

0:14:00.079,0:14:04.760
over many centuries or thousands of years.

0:14:07.039,0:14:08.750
I always thought about beeswax.

0:14:08.750,0:14:10.581
It's very close to pollen.

0:14:11.474,0:14:14.888
The first wax pieces were very small works.

0:14:16.468,0:14:21.380
I wanted to have just only beeswax,[br]but then, of course, it's not stable really.

0:14:21.380,0:14:24.482
It's not an easy, practical thing to do.

0:14:26.361,0:14:32.953
I work from the inside, and somehow,[br]I had to have my head inside these small pieces,

0:14:32.953,0:14:39.150
and I remember this experience[br]of just having only your head inside.

0:14:41.311,0:14:47.730
What an incredible experience this was,[br]and I had really the idea to make a space

0:14:47.730,0:14:51.748
which not only your head is inside,[br]that your body is inside,

0:14:51.748,0:14:54.802
just surrounded by beeswax and nothing else.

0:14:56.070,0:15:02.269
The beginning of the beeswax spaces I made[br]were for exhibitions, so it's a different

0:15:02.269,0:15:03.035
technique

0:15:03.035,0:15:06.846
where I made slabs which you can install.

0:15:08.325,0:15:11.320
The one which I made now at the Phillips,[br]they can be permanent,

0:15:11.320,0:15:19.157
so I put the wax directly on the wall,[br]and it's like one piece, and you cannot remove it.

0:15:21.469,0:15:24.502
My smallest wax room I ever made.

0:15:26.875,0:15:30.927
So it's a more intense experience.

0:15:32.243,0:15:37.009
The aroma of the beeswax has a deep feeling.

0:15:38.419,0:15:42.694
It's like going into a cave or going into[br]another world.

0:15:44.879,0:15:48.983
If the beeswax is in the dark,[br]it doesn't have this golden glow,

0:15:48.983,0:15:54.272
and it's a very simple way of having this[br]golden glow,

0:15:54.272,0:15:56.233
with just a simple light bulb,

0:15:56.867,0:16:00.260
because that gives this yellowish light on[br]the beeswax,

0:16:00.260,0:16:03.560
which has a connection to the medieval paintings,

0:16:03.560,0:16:05.860
the golden background.

0:16:15.449,0:16:21.220
I began these works in this small village[br]in southern Germany for myself.

0:16:21.220,0:16:28.220
I was 27 or so, and I had the first pollen jars.

0:16:28.220,0:16:30.450
I had the first milkstones.

0:16:30.450,0:16:33.610
I felt this is the most important thing in[br]the world.

0:16:33.610,0:16:35.259
This will change the world.

0:16:35.259,0:16:37.520
I was extremely naive.

0:16:43.468,0:16:49.079
I had this strive to show this as soon as[br]possible

0:16:49.079,0:16:53.440
to as many people as possible in the world.

0:16:53.440,0:16:56.563
(visitors chattering)

0:16:56.563,0:17:02.603
My idea of exhibitions in showing this was[br]about this.

0:17:02.720,0:17:08.010
I felt this is the essence of life[br]and this is something which holds the world

0:17:08.010,0:17:09.010
together.

0:17:10.913,0:17:13.508
And it was not about becoming a famous artist.

0:17:13.508,0:17:17.819
It was really, I felt, this is what I searched[br]in medicine

0:17:17.819,0:17:23.072
and somehow I did not find it in the medical[br]science.

0:17:31.900,0:17:34.340
I feel I never changed my profession.

0:17:34.340,0:17:38.627
I did with these things what I wanted to do[br]as a doctor.

0:17:48.000,0:17:59.865
(visitors chattering)

0:18:02.673,0:18:07.901
(ambient electronic music)

0:18:07.901,0:18:10.348
To learn more about "Art in the Twenty-First Century"

0:18:10.348,0:18:12.164
and its educational resources,

0:18:12.164,0:18:16.419
please visit us online at PBS.org/Art21

0:18:17.288,0:18:20.564
"Art in the Twenty-First Century" is available on DVD

0:18:20.564,0:18:26.135
To order, visit shopPBS.org or call 1-800-PLAY-PBS

0:18:26.135,0:18:32.124
(ambient electronic music)