NEW YORK—Dubbed the “granddaddy of Conceptualism,” the artist Lawrence Weiner, 65, is finally getting his first U.S. retrospective, opening November 15 at New York’s Whitney Museum. His métier is language-based sculptures in which phrases are imprinted in large block letters on walls and public façades, even across manhole covers. Sarah Douglas visits the Bronx-born Weiner in his Manhattan studio to discuss public art, politics and pornography.

Collectors who purchase your work receive no more than a polite letter informing them that they have taken responsibility for what amounts to a snippet of language. Do you ever have disagreements with them about how your pieces are to be installed?

As long as they don’t change the words, no. They can use lipstick [to execute them] if they want.

What’s the strangest thing anyone’s ever done with your work?

A very famous acrobat in France had one tattooed on his chest.

A few years ago, you collaborated with New York’s Public Art Fund to replace 19 downtown Manhattan manhole covers with ones you emblazoned with the phrase “In Direct Line with Another and the Next.” Didn’t you once say you like such projects best?

I enjoy it when my work is displayed in a public space, because the people who become attached to it are becoming attached to something they found, not something they already knew about. Later, perhaps, they do some research and find out what it’s all about.

A dramatic work of yours is on the façade of the Italian pavilion at the Venice Biennale, which closes this month. It reads “Matter so Shaken to Its Core to Lead to a Change in Inherent Form.” What’s your opinion of the rest of the show?

Ellsworth Kelly’s paintings are the high point. I’m a real fan. When I’m 84 years old, I hope I’m making work that is that precise and gorgeous. And unpretentious.

What do you think of art fairs?

I don’t like them.

An artist once told me that being at an art fair was like being a whore at a pimps’ convention.

It’s like being in the living room of a bordello as people pick and choose.

You now show in New York with Marian Goodman. But in the ’70s you were represented by the great dealer Leo Castelli. Tell me something about him.

He hated limousines. He’d say, “If you’re rich, you should have your own car. If you don’t, take a taxi! This is New York! Nobody’s going to kidnap you!” We did beautiful shows. I judge my dealers by the ones I’ve made beautiful shows with.

As part of your Whitney retrospective, the theater Anthology Film Archives is screening your many movies—conceptual shorts to extended narratives. Is it true that you are soon to begin work on a quasi-porn flick along the lines of one you shot in the ’70s?

In 1976 I made a crude, kitchen-table porn tape that was about making porn. Gianni Jetzer, director of the Swiss Institute in New York, approached me recently and said, “You ought to make a new one.” He’s financing it, and it’s going to be in a big show in March at the institute. Actually, I got an award for the original tape. And I was invited to join the Directors Guild of America.

What do you think has been your influence on other artists?

Positive.

You once said, “Art should be very expensive when it’s brand-new, like a car. And then it should get lower and lower in value. It should be really expensive when it begins, so the artist can have the money to continue working.”

When the work is fresh and it changes your whole perception of life, it’s like falling in love. That’s what is worth your money.

What is this book sitting here on your desk called Love for Sale?

It’s very private. It’s a list of my works for sale. So I remember which dealer has what piece.

Appropriate title.

Yes, I thought so, too.

"Conversation with Lawrence Weiner" originally appeared in the November 2007 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's November 2007 Table of Contents.