NPR's Morning Edition interviewed Beck this morning about Modern Guilt, and, of course, his relationship with his grandfather, Fluxus member Al Hansen. I love this image of Hansen sending his grandkids to scour restaurants for cigarette butts out of ashtrays:
"He liked to say he was an alchemist," Beck says. "But really, it was that he was broke. He couldn't afford art materials. So I think he decided early on, 'I'm going to make art out of what I have around,' which was candy wrappers and cigarette butts. When I was a child, he used to send us to the garbage can. When we were at a restaurant, we'd go to all the ashtrays that were left — we used to collect all the cigarette butts for him for his artwork."
Now that's grandparenting.
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