The Man Behind the Bucket: Making Self-Portraits From Trash | Short Film Showcase

I don't go somewhere to search because if you search things you don't find them. So I go mostly and then I get surprised by what I find there. I have things in my mind, but I never would say I need this certain kind of chair or that kind of chair or something. I would really be focused on something when not. We open on other things, what I see or what I really like.

I found something from the 60s to lose weight: these things with the belt they put on around your hip, and then it starts to shake you. It's kind of noise. I mean, it was not my plan to find it, but now I picked it up and I see what I can do with it. I'm always very open to what happens to me, like by coincidence. In German, there's a word, it's called "zufällig," which means it comes to you; you don't plan it. And that's really it. Just, yeah, it describes quite well.

When I began to study hard, I was really into performance art from the 70s, but I never wanted to be a kind of performance artist because then it's really hard to tell: is it you as an artist, or is it the work? Interesting. I made a one self-portrait which was called "Carry as Much as You Can." And once, I tried to carry as much as I can, and then I put something on my head. So there was a way not showing my face and using my body somehow for the art.

The play is a big part of it because when you play, you find new things. That's how I found really important aspects in my work. I would say it took me six weeks to install the piece. I start, and then I change, and I see what's happening, and then I react to what's happening. It takes more time, but it's more interesting and it's more individual for me.

Great. I do collect objects or work with objects—used objects, found objects—since I'm studying. And like, so I began 15, 16 years ago with that kind of material. I still like the idea that you can really get the stuff, keep it cheaper, and make art. I just liked it. I do and change the meaning of objects, change the value of it.

I did have an older camera with a 10-second self-timer. It made me make a movie about it—about disposing and not finding the right position. So I made a movie about a king who's failing completely with his positions. I mean, it has a kind of a passive flash on old master paintings, and if really liked, a high reputation and their kind of authority as well. So I really like to play with these authorities in art.

I think the whole situation that you have this huge... we know it's like already the whole thing is on stage. It's not like open the door and then you come in. So you see all of a sudden this big space already when you come around the corner. I got once a crate back from Mexico from an exhibition—a really big one. I just had the idea that you can move into this crate and you can discover spaces that you don't see at all.

It makes you feel you're in a completely different location all of a sudden. So you have an experience not just by your eyes; it's a full-body experience somehow. So you have to walk through, you have to move, and some people feel like kids again. So it's very playful. It sounds fun. I mean, I like humor in my work, and I have to do this for more than, I don't know, 30, 40 years or something. So I have to entertain myself somehow.