Andrea Zittel in "Consumption" - Season 1 - "Art in the Twenty-First Century" | Art21

(soft upbeat music)

ANDREA ZITTEL: Painting and sculpture, they're 
forms of representation.

I don't think that anything that 
I do is so dissimilar from that.

In some way, these are all attempts to talk about

my own subjective interpretation of the world,

and to also do something that will relate 
to other people's experiences within it.

I grew up in very suburban southern California.

I think my parents had this fantasy

about building a country home 
in the middle of nowhere.

So my dad built our home 
on the edge of a mountain.

By the time I was in high school, it was 
completely built up, it was suburbia.

It was only after I moved to New York 
that I realized what a gift it was

to come from someplace so normal.

I moved to New York in 1990, 
and the first place I lived in

was this really tiny storefront, also in Brooklyn.

At that time I was doing really different work.

I was actually working with 
animals and breeding them.

For instance, a breeding unit, 
not only would it influence

the way that the animal would develop,

But it would also have everything built into 
it that the animal would need for living.

So, you know, after doing this work and 
living in this tiny space for a while,

I think that it started to make perfect sense to

try and create structures like 
that for myself to live in.

The living unit was meant to function 
for every single thing that I needed.

You know, I didn't have a shower or 
bathtub, so it had this large plastic sink

that I could take baths in 
as well as wash my dishes in.

It had a built-in kitchen area, it had 
a desk area, it had a sleeping area.

It was sort of like building a house, 
just something that I could own

and would be permanent and it would just go inside

of the houses that other people would own.

I literally believed that when I made that piece

and I had it completely perfected

That it would solve all of my problems, you know?

And it was this really wonderful 
period in my life of feeling like

I was moving towards this concrete direction.

And the irony is that when I 
finally finished the living unit

and it was perfect and there 
was nothing left to do to it,

I felt completely despondent and very 
sort of, like, listless and depressed.

And at that point, in sort 
of gauging my own reaction,

I had this revelation that no 
one really wants perfection.

We're obsessed with perfection,

we're obsessed with innovation 
and moving forwards,

but what we really want is the hope of some sort

of new and improved or better tomorrow.

(rumbling outside)

I think that my work's always been really 
influenced by the places that I've lived in.

(blinds opening)

In fact, if you look at every body 
of work, you can trace it back to

particular circumstances 
that I've had to deal with.

WOMAN: Well, I mean, the kitchen is a 
good stop, sort of, on the A-Z tour

because what I said about the 
kitchen and how I used the kitchen.

Andrea is not a cook, right?

Which is really obvious because she's 
got a teeny, tiny refrigerator and –

my chicken lived in the kitchen.

And her chicken lived in the kitchen.

But you have this huge table 
in the presentation room

which facilitates big dinner parties.

we did stay strict to Andrea's, you know,

sort of utilitarian bowl system of 
the small, medium, and large bowls.

–So you just used bowls for your dinner parties?

There were times when we just used –

–I've always wondered if you cheated.

–Oh, yeah.

I think it's a really nice thing 
to talk about, is this floor.

I always felt it was this modernism 
put into a domestic framework.

One of the things, too,

that I wanted to do with this house was to sort of

reflect the earlier generations of modernism.

I usually point to the outside, 
because that's really one of

the most beautiful parts of the house.

Particularly a garden in Brooklyn.

The bathroom at the A-Z, Andrea's house,

is the tour de force of the house.

It's sort of the epitome of 
organization, comfort, and utility.

I mean, the floor is really particular in 
that Andrea hand-laid every tile, right?

Painstakingly.

Well, they come in square foot 
sections, but I did that by myself.

And then you'll notice that the medicine 
cabinets, instead of throwing all of your stuff

under the sink abyss,

is organized in "Correction," 
"Tools and implements,"

"Subtraction," and "Addition."

And "Addition" is sort of obvious things of –

cosmetics, skin lotion, deodorant.

And "Subtraction"?

Is things for cleansing and taking away.

And then everything on top is 
organized, labeled accordingly.

That's sort of it for the bathroom, huh?

ZITTEL: For nine years I've been 
doing the uniform project,

where I have one garment 
that I'll wear for a season.

Originally it was for a six-month season,

now it's for a four-month season.

Oh, this is a really good one.

This is from last spring.

And it's rayon.

They kind of get worn out and tattered by the end,

after wearing them for four months.

It started because I had an office job

and I was supposed to wear 
something respectable to work

but I didn't have that much money.

Sort of colorful spring dress.

You know, most of the time, we can 
afford, like, one fabulous outfit

that you really love to wear.

But there's some sort of social stigma

against wearing the same thing two days in a row.

So I decided that, you know, 
in my case, actually, like,

variety seemed more oppressive 
or restrictive than continuity.

So this is basically your standard personal panel.

For several years, I could wear anything,

as long as it was made out of a rectangle.

It ties in the back, and 
the top ties behind my neck.

The Russian constructivists made 
clothing that was very geometric.

They felt like when you weave 
fabric, it's in a rectangle.

So when you actually take that 
rectangle and cut it into other shapes

and then sew it into even different shapes,

that you're completely ruining 
the integrity of the fabric.

I thought I would just take it and for 
fun push it to its furthest extreme,

which was making garments only from rectangles.

But with just some subtle changes, you have this 
huge array of, you know, kind of references.

After a while, I got sort of tired 
of wearing rectangles all the time.

But keeping within that set of parameters,

the only thing that I could 
think of that would be like

a first-hand form of creating something,

where you're not making one thing 
and changing it into something else,

was making something from a strand.

So that's why I've been crocheting my dresses now.

It's that, you know, everything becomes 
like this one sort of continuous strand.

The most insane dress is the one 
I'm going to wear next summer,

or this summer.

(drawer closing)

This is actually – this is the dress

that I've made to wear on the island in Denmark.

And I started making this over a year 
ago, when I started traveling to Denmark,

and I realized how cold and 
rainy it is there all the time.

So this is kind of like the Alpine fantasy dress.

You know, my parents liked to travel,

but we didn't have that much money 
because they were school teachers.

So we would always have these 
sort of crazy summer schemes,

you know, like going to Europe 
and camping across Europe.

They had a Volkswagen bus.

So I spent a lot of time in a very, 
very small space with my family.

When I was 12, they bought a 31-foot sailboat.

And so we did sailing trips in that.

I always hated sailing, but I was really obsessed 
with the way that the boat would function.

(tap running)

(tap closed)

This is actually a model for a second 
variation on a piece that I've been working on

for the last few years called "A pocket property."

It's about a 54-foot by 23-foot 
concrete floating island.

The idea is that it's meant 
– it's, um, your property

and your dwelling and your vehicle all in one.

One mass-reproducible component.

(scraping noise)

Last summer we basically built the entire island.

And then it was opened in conjunction 
with an architectural exhibition.

This summer, actually, in about 3 or 4 days,

I'm going to go to Denmark 
and live on it for a month.

And for one part of that, for 
one week of that month actually,

some friends are going to come 
out, and we're going to make

a film about the experience 
of living on the island.

(motor over moving water noises)

–Hello.

–I'm Axel.

I'm from --

This is Jorgen, my photographer.

I've actually been trying to call you.

I'm actually really excited about this project,

because, you know, in the beginning,

my art was always very experience-based.

I mean, in some projects, there's not 
even a tangible product, you know,

object that comes out in the end.

Okay, so there's no way we can wait and 
do it, like tomorrow or the next day?

It's a long trip.

I feel that having these, like, 
really wonderful experiences,

which are completely unpredictable –

you know, like setting up a scenario where 
I test some sort of living situation.

You know, partially because 
I'm terrified of doing it,

partially because I'm really, like, you 
know, enchanted by the idea of doing it.

But not really knowing beforehand if it's going

to be a great experience or a horrible one.

Can you see the new plants growing?

No.

You have the small ones here?

Yeah, I planted them a few days ago.

They're finally starting to grow.

It looks like what I'm trying 
to remove in my garden,

you know, with going like this all the time.

Weeds?

Yeah.

Yeah, but on an island, you're 
even grateful for the weeds.

Don't you have a need to 
get in contact with people?

That's why I'm out here, 
to get away from you guys.

Most of your work is like being alone, isn't it?

Yeah, most of my work's about creating really sort 
of intimate, personal, controllable situations.

Yeah.

Like, all of my ideas, they're sort of humorous,

but they're also a little dark at the same time.

You know, it's like I have this fantasy of being

completely autonomous and 
independent and, you know, at peace.

And, like, not having any of, 
like, the day-to-day problems.

But then there's also the sense of, 
like, isolation that comes along with it.

(calm music)

People say that my work's about 
design or it's about leisure.

But really, I think that it's much –

like the main issues are 
much less tangible than that.

The issues that I'm really interested in are,

you know, human values and perceptions

and how you think that you understand certain,

you know, fundamental values that you, you know –

within your life, and you think 
you understand what they are

and that you need these things.

But then they're constantly 
inverting into each other.

It's like things that you think are liberating

can actually become extremely 
confining or restrictive or repressive.

And things that you think are controlling

can actually give you

a greater sense of security 
and liberation in the end.