Joseph Beuys - Schlitten

NARRATOR

Joseph Beuys called this sled an “emergency object.”

 

[SOUNDFX: Sirens / Sounds of panic / Running]

 

JEFF KOONS

My name is Jeff Koons. I’m an artist. So if I look at a Joseph Beuys sled, I look and I start to think of well ...the type of narrative. You're surviving in some way through movement. You have mobility.

 

NARRATOR

Joseph Beuys from a 1979 documentary film.

 

JOSEPH BEUYS

In a state of emergency the Volkswagen bus is of limited usefulness…at more direct and primitive means must be taken to insure survival. The most direct kind of movement over the earth is the sliding of the iron runners of the sled.

 

NARRATOR

For Joseph Beuys, a seminal conceptual artist, it was necessary to survival. Beuys said.

 

JOSEPH BEUYS

Each sled carries its own survival kit. The flashlight represents the sense of orientation…the felt is for protection…and the fat is food.

 

NARRATOR

Many of the materials Beuys used referred to his own experience: As the story goes, in 1944 as part of the German air force, Beuys’ plane was shot down over enemy territory. He survived the crash, but barely. His body was discovered by a tribe of Tartars, who nursed him back to health by covering him in animal fat and wrapping him in felt. 12 days later, he awoke.

 

Whatever happened exactly, Beuys had a personal transformation which compelled him to spend the rest of his life devoted to making art.

 

JEFF KOONS

If I would look at this sled and think about the transformative healing powers that are in play, it's, of course, a metaphor for the transcendence that art brings into your life.