Coyote Snuggly

"The whole process of living is my creative act."

Joseph Beuys (artist)

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Boat. Train. Plane. Folks like to travel in all sorts of ways. Yet few opt to be shipped around in a felt blanket, wrapped from head to toe like a holiday present.

So why did German-born artist Joseph Beuys choose to journey this way to the United States?

The journey in question takes place in 1974 when the artist is on his way to New York to present a new performance piece, I Like America and America Likes Me. The day of Beuys’ departure, an ambulance arrives at his home. There is no accident to attend to--this is his ride!

Photograph of Joseph Beuys.
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Laid out on a stretcher and covered by a felt blanket (a material that appears in many of his works), Beuys is taken to the airport. After clearing customs at JFK, he is again wrapped up and carted off via ambulance, sirens blaring, to a Manhattan gallery.

Joseph Beuys, "I Like America and America Likes Me", performance piece, 1974.

Inside the gallery, Beuys settles in with a new roommate. For three days, viewers come to watch him eat, sleep and commune with, believe it or not, a wild coyote.

An important symbol in many Native American cultures, the coyote refers to the destruction inflicted by European settlers. His performance is, in part, an attempt to repair that damage. "You could say that a reckoning has to be made with the coyote, and only then can this trauma be lifted," he says.

Joseph Beuys, "I Like America and America Likes Me", performance piece, 1974

Beuys returns to Germany the way he came in, swaddled in fabric. Never once do his feet touch American soil: it’s his way of protesting the Vietnam War and making his performance about both old and new conflicts. For Beuys, art and activism go hand in hand.