German Steelworks Soars with Serra

Friedhelm Pickhan's generally jaundiced opinion of artists was not altered by his first contact with American sculptor Richard Serra. In 1997, Serra faxed Pickhan a sheet of paper with little more on it than three curved lines drawn with a thick pencil. Serra wanted to know if Pickhan Heavy Fabrication in north German steel country could turn those lines into a monumental sculpture.

Pickhan, now 66, is the epitome of a down-to-earth German Handwerker, with a voice like sandpaper and a penchant for Marlboro Lights, which he smokes halfway, then stubs out and stashes away in the package to finish later. He took the Serra job, despite his reservations. "I didn't know a thing about art," he says. "But we had invested in a new machine and we needed work for it."