tv Lou Dobbs Tonight FOX Business October 18, 2017 4:00am-5:00am EDT
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>> a daughter inherits a mysterious diary from her father, an artist who survived the holocaust. >> he had to live so that he could show the scenes that he witnessed. >> his words become her quest. >> i made a promise to my father that i would show his artwork to the world. >> these pages, her road map. >> here is a man who went through so much horror. >> but can she recover what the nazis stole from him? >> what do you think went on in that room? ♪ i'm jamie colby, and, today, i'm in rockland county, new york, an hour north of new york city. i am meeting a viewer who wrote
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me about her strange inheritance and how it turned her into a sort of time traveler, right back to her father's harrowing past. >> my name is miriam friedman morris. my father, david friedman, a painter and holocaust survivor, left me a diary, "tagebuch fuer miriam friedman." as i read it, the diary led me on a remarkable journey that continues to this day. >> miriam, i'm jamie. >> hi. welcome. >> miriam wrote us an e-mail that said... it was so impassioned, i had to meet her. my goodness. look at all of this. i feel like i'm in fine-art gallery or a museum. tell me about your parents. >> my parents were both holocaust survivors, and in 1954, we moved from israel to new york. >> in her mind's eye, little
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miriam sees only gauzy pictures of her father's past. he doesn't tell her all that much. she knows he was a painter, who, in world war i, drew combat scenes on the russian front and was decorated for bravery. but she's in the dark about the full scope of his artistic career, including hundreds of drawings of top personalities for german newspapers and exhibitions of his work in major cities. in december 1938, friedman fled berlin for prague, czechoslovakia, after what's known as "kristallnacht" or "the night of broken glass," when jewish homes, businesses, and synagogues throughout germany and austria were ransacked. in prague, he continues to paint portraits. he snaps black-and-white photos of them and puts them in albums, which somehow survive. >> i would go and look in the albums, and this one really spoke to me. >> but he doesn't tell her the stories behind those pictures.
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>> he knew that i was looking at the pictures in the book. i was really quite fascinated with them. he just would watch me, but he wouldn't really say much. >> young miriam knows her father was in a concentration camp but not how he got there or how in the world he survived. how did your parents meet? >> they met in a small town about one hour from prague. it was a place where the survivors went for healing. >> nor does miriam know about her father's disappointing attempt in israel to use his talent to express the horrors of the holocaust. he'd only write about that years later. >> "i had a one-man show in tel aviv with paintings of the concentration camps. i'm sorry to say, the interest was only small, and learned people do not want to talk about concentration camps. >> feeling defeated, the 60-year-old artist moves his wife and 4-year-old daughter to new york and madison avenue.
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and that was really, like, the "mad men" era. your dad went into advertising. >> that's right. and the company moved us from new york to st. louis, where he was a lead artist. >> that's the dad miriam grows up knowing -- the guy who paints these gigantic billboards for major clients, like michelob and 7 up. what was your childhood like in the united states? >> we were happy and we had a beautiful apartment. i noticed many of our friends had accents and had the numbers on the arm. the survivors all were the same, in the sense they wanted their children to have a better life. >> in search of the american dream. >> indeed. >> for david, the american dream demands compromise. >> "i had to forget about art paintings and i had to forget what was hidden in my heart -- the pictures from the concentration camps. i had to work hard to make a
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living. >> then, in 1961, an envelope in the mail sends his spirits soaring. it contains a reparations check -- $4,350 -- from the west german government for his looted art. it wasn't the money but the official recognition that his life's work -- all but obliterated by the nazis -- meant something. >> i remember lots of excitement in the house. i really didn't understand it at the time, but i knew that it was very important to my father, who had been recognized for his case against the german reich for the loss of his paintings. >> now, at 68, david sets up his easel, full of trepidation. >> "i had the idea to try again but was afraid to start. >> he alone can put to canvas the evil he witnessed. he tried years before. he's now ready to try again. >> "in december 1963, in the
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night, i quietly left our bedroom for my studio, placed a piece of paper on the easel, took charcoal, and made my first sketch." >> over four furious months, friedman creates 28 haunting drawings -- memories of the holocaust. >> it was like the pent-up emotion of images that lived inside of him. he just tore it out of his head and put it on this canvas. >> the drawings awe miriam. she becomes more and more curious about her father's past. on a college trip to germany in 1970, she visits an aunt she'd never met, who has a painting she's never seen. >> it was a painting of my father's first wife, mathilde friedman. >> miriam had only heard mathilde spoken of in whispers. david married her in 1937, but
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she perished during the war. >> i wrote my father from germany that i had seen the painting, and he didn't understand what i was talking about. >> her father arranges to have the painting sent from west berlin to st. louis. >> my father took the package and he went into the bedroom for three days. >> what do you think went on in that room? >> i think he was remembering a woman that he had loved and lost. >> after college, miriam launches her own career as a fashion designer. she moves to new york, marries harold morris, and starts a family. then, in february 1980, her father peacefully passes away at 86. and then comes her strange inheritance. >> when my father died, my mother handed me the little diary with my name on it.
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>> he started writing it the day miriam was born. turns out that the father who had revealed only fragments of his past would now fill in the blanks. >> the more i learned about him, it sort of drove me to rescue him from obscurity. >> where it drove her next. >> but, first, our "strange inheritance" quiz question. in the movie "the monuments men," george clooney is intent on recovering what work of art looted by the germans? the answer in a moment. liberty mutual stood with me when this guy got a flat tire in the middle of the night, so he got home safe. yeah, my dad says our insurance doesn't have that. what?! you can leave worry behind when liberty stands with you™. liberty mutual insurance. ♪ ca♪ yes you can ♪ can i kick it?
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>> it's "c," michelangelo's "madonna and child." it becomes paramount in the film after nazis kill one of clooney's men who attempted to prevent its theft. >> when painter and holocaust survivor david friedman dies in 1980, he leaves his daughter, miriam, a diary he wrote for her. she can't bring herself to read her strange inheritance until her mother dies, in 1989. when she does, one statement in the opening pages stops her cold. >> "nazi criminals deported me, my wife, mathilde, and child, also named miriam." >> as a girl, miriam had picked up inklings about a half-sister
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with the same name who was killed in the war. but now, reading about her, in her father's hand... >> i was quite astounded that many of the things that he spoke about from his first daughter were similar to experiences that i had with my father, like he taught her how to paint and he wrote about how he kept scrapbooks of her art. >> she reads on. her father reveals details about his life after the germans conquered most of europe and began deporting millions of jews to ghettos and concentration camps. the nazis loot her father's apartment in berlin and steal his artwork after he and his family flee to prague, czechoslovakia. >> "i was only married for two years and had a 3-month-old baby. and there was the anxiety of how to get out of this hell." >> in 1941, the germans deport
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friedman, now 48, his wife, mathilde, and their daughter from prague to a large ghetto in the polish city of lodz. in august 1944, the nazis liquidate the ghetto and deport the 65,000 jews living there to concentration camps. >> my father was on the last train to auschwitz, and he never saw his wife and child again. >> upon arrival at auschwitz, men and boys are led one way, women and girls another. he never learns how and where his wife and daughter die, though the gas chamber is most likely. david's life is spared. >> "i would not be alive today were it not for a lucky fluke." >> using improvised paints and brushes, david creates a mural of a nearby river on the prison wall. his talent impresses the guards. they let him live.
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friedman survives five more months in the nazis' most notorious death camp. then, on january 25, 1945, the russians arrive. he is liberated and heads to czechoslovakia. but miriam's strange inheritance does more than fill in the gaps about her father's life. it leaves clues for miriam to find his lost art and implores her to restore his legacy, which, like so many others, was all but erased by the nazis. >> "between 1919 and 1933, my works were constantly on view in the various exhibitions of the berlin academy of the arts." >> the more i learned about him, it sort of drove me to rescue him from obscurity. >> to rescue him from obscurity, miriam writes to museums and archives in germany and czechoslovakia. polite responses offer nothing. it's as though her father never painted, never existed.
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european art appraiser robin starr says miriam faces a needle-in-the-haystack challenge. how much art did the nazis loot? >> millions of works. hitler was collecting them for his own private collection, and there were soldiers at all ranks who were grabbing and plundering. >> in 1994, miriam flies to europe to use the diary to reassemble the pieces of her father's life. what did you find? >> i went to berlin, to the newspaper archives that i had been told previously did not exist. and i was very excited to find portraits my father published in the newspaper. >> it's miriam's first big discovery -- a vast spread of her father's sketches, from the 1920s to early '30s, of luminaries including politicians, sports personalities, and musicians. and what did finding the
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newspaper clipping do for you? >> it showed me that i could find more. it would help me find evidence of the lost work that the nazis did not destroy. >> and miriam's strange inheritance is about to lead to more evidence -- kept by the nazis themselves -- that will resurrect some of friedman's early paintings and shed new light on his darkest works. this is a particularly disturbing drawing for me -- electrocution by choice. why do you think your father didn't make that choice? that's next. >> here's another quiz question for you. the answer in a moment.
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>> it's "b." in 1939, museum director jacques jaujard smuggled it out of the louvre in an ambulance to the french countryside. >> like an impressionist painting that gets clearer as you step back from it, so, too, has miriam friedman morris' image of her father. she's been following clues in this diary, which she inherited after he died. she's had some luck in berlin, where she found hundreds of drawings he did for the newspapers. then, in 2003, miriam and her daughter, lauren, meet with the director at the jewish museum in prague. the museum discovers, in its archives, these meticulous nazi-era catalog cards that name specific works of art by her father and when the nazis looted
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each one. and along with the catalog cards... >> i discovered the jewish museum held several of my father's works. >> including this image of a jewish holiday celebration and lithographs of david's hometown in czechoslovakia. in all, miriam uncovers nine of her father's artworks. and what does it feel like for you, miriam, when you find a piece of your father in that way? >> it is so exhilarating. it feels so triumphant. one more work that has survived that the nazis did not destroy. >> one painting she discovers is of a jewish cemetery in prague, a cemetery which she visits with her daughter, lauren. >> it was just unbelievable to me that his artwork existed outside my house, outside the museums here in the united states, and it made me very excited to see what else we could discover. >> they discover, next, a living link to her father's past. april 2009, miriam's speaking to
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a new york audience about that photo album from her youth. >> it showed my father's pre-war career, and there was a portrait of a young girl. she looked to be about 8, 9 years old. >> suddenly, another speaker on the panel gasps. she recognizes this girl. >> she said that it was her friend, and she had moved to buffalo. >> does she still have the portrait? >> yes. >> here, after all those years, is the actual portrait david friedman painted back in 1941. >> it's the only portrait painting, from this period of my father's life as a refugee in prague, to survive. >> when you've identified someone that was in one of your father's paintings, what is going on with your heart and your mind? >> it's just like everything comes together. >> it also makes it impossible to forget that others her father painted did not survive. but miriam believes her father's
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life and her journey are unfolding this way for a reason, all going back to the vow she made to him the night he died. did you make him a promise at his bedside? that's next. what's your strange inheritance story? we'd love to hear it. send me an e-mail or go to our website, strangeinheritance.com. ♪yea, you can be the greatest ♪you can be the best ♪you can be the king kong
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"strange inheritance." >> we've told you the story of artist and holocaust survivor david friedman, his first wife and daughter killed by the nazis, his life's work looted, how he came to america and started over... and how the strange inheritance he left his second daughter sent her on a journey to reclaim his legacy. we haven't told you about his dying wish and his daughter's vow. >> did you make him a promise at his bedside?
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>> all he could think about was what was going to happen to his concentration-camp pictures. i made a promise to my father that i would show his artwork to the world. >> those concentration-camp pictures were not the ones lost in europe or mentioned in the diary. they're the ones he furiously drew here in america, as a retired sign painter, in his late 60s. but they were, in fact, his most impassioned work, the art father and daughter both knew that he was put on earth to create. keeping her promise, she donates some to the u.s. holocaust memorial museum here in washington, d.c. this is a particularly disturbing drawing for me -- electrocution by choice. the drawing depicts concentration-camp inmates throwing themselves against the electrified barbed wire. >> people had been dehumanized, tortured. they could no longer think, and this was a better option. >> why do you think your father
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didn't make that choice? >> he had to live so that he could show the scenes that he witnessed. that was a powerful reason for his survival. >> he had to live to show what he witnessed. miriam also ensures his paintings find a home at the renowned yad vashem holocaust museum in jerusalem. half a century after david friedman felt defeated by that failed exhibit in tel aviv, his paintings are now on permanent display at israel's leading holocaust memorial, all due to a daughter inspired by her strange inheritance. >> even when i was young, i knew he was special. i wanted him to be recognized as an artist and i have achieved that. >> are you proud of her? >> very. >> miriam's daughter, lauren. one day, her mother's strange inheritance will pass to her. what will she do with it? the diary, the story, your mother's efforts -- do you feel
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a responsibility to continue her work? >> i feel a huge responsibility. i just hope that everybody from the next century on will not forget what happened. >> behind me are bleak reminders of kristallnacht, "the night of broken glass," the awful night in november 1938 that convinced david friedman he had to flee berlin. but here's what happened 70 years later, in november 2008 -- the berlin philharmonic commemorated kristallnacht with a concert, accompanied by an exhibit of david friedman's artwork. the 30 portraits featured jewish composers, musicians, and conductors, many of whom were part of the berlin orchestra before the nazis took it over, an historical treasure from an era the nazis tried to erase and a testament to the enduring power of david friedman's
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artistry. i'm jamie colby. thanks for watching "strange inheritance." >> a regular old dad... >> all he said was, "who's gonna buy something from bill wagner?" >> turned art scene heavyweight. >> he went from very clean-cut to start wearing brighter-colored shirts, and then his hair grew long. >> how important a name is he? >> there are no comparables. >> he leaves behind a puzzle. >> oh, the sun is shining. or it's an egg. are you sure these go together? >> it's always a mystery. >> this is all your dad's? >> it's a very small portion of the art that he produced. >> how do you handle an 8-ton inheritance? >> every single day, i've thought, "what am i going to do with it?" [ door creaks ] [ wind howls ] [ thunder rumbles ] [ bird caws ]
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♪ >> i'm jamie colby, and today, i'm driving in the san francisco bay area in benicia. i'm here to meet two brothers who wrote to me, saying they've inherited a pretty hefty haul. my mission -- to assess the gravity of their situation. >> my name is ron wagner. my father was bill wagner, one of the most prolific artists of his day. my brother and i realize that his art should never be judged by the pound, but the situation does weigh on us. >> i meet ron at his father's house here in benicia. hi, ron. i'm jamie. >> hi, jamie. it's nice to meet you. >> it's clear from the front porch that his dad was a creative and colorful guy. >> my dad painted every one of these tiles individually by hand. and there's lots more inside. >> yes, i'm coming inside. >> yes. >> suddenly, i'm surrounded by this strange inheritance. ron, the door was just a tease.
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every room is covered in painted tiles. look at this! incredible! and that's just the beginning. his father's art studio is jam packed with thousands more. this is all your dad's? >> this is just a little bit, actually. he was very prolific. >> these are very beautiful. it looks like each one does tell a story. >> they do. >> stories about the life of bill wagner, who was born in 1923 in san francisco. his own murals tell his tale. you think he was born an artist? >> i think his artistry came from being whisked off to central america by a cantankerous father who had gold fever. >> his father never finds that gold, but the colorful misadventures will have a big impact on young bill's imagination. the family returns to california in 1934 to start again from scratch.
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as a teenager, bill dreams of attending art school, but world war ii intervenes. he enlists in the army. d-day, june 6, 1944. >> he's in a boat. the conditions are horrible. the next thing he has to do is get off that boat and jump on a beach. >> not just any beach, normandy. >> normandy. he walked onto the beach and was immediately hit by a bomb. >> how close to death was he? >> very close. he was given the last rites three times. he remembered hearing the medics tell him that he wasn't going to make it. >> he's shipped back to a veterans' hospital in california. his recovery, slow and painful. >> he lost a kidney. he was almost paralyzed in one leg. >> he was flat on his back, dealing with pain, dealing with the medication. >> to cope with the trauma, bill turns to his passion. >> when he was in the hospital, he started sketching and drawing full-time.
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>> he also finds love of another kind. >> that's where he met my mom, who used to come and tell him stories and read to him. >> the two are married in 1945, and start a family. bill finally gets around to taking those art classes and soon deploys his talents in the new medium of television. >> he was in charge of all of the costumes, all of the lighting, all of the set construction, going to work every day in a suit and tie, doing art, but still playing the company role. >> in the late 1970s, when bill is in his mid-50s, he quits his job, gets divorced and decides to become a full-time artist. he also changes his name to something more exotic. his longtime friend toni andrews tells me more. >> all he said was, "who's gonna buy something from bill wagner?" guillermo is bill in spanish. granizo is his mother's maiden name. and he says, "i'd buy something
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from from guillermo granizo, but bill wagner, i don't know." >> how did his look change? >> he went from very clean-cut to start wearing brighter-colored shirts, and then his hair grew long. >> we used to call him the hippie. here i was with a suit and tie on, going to work, and he was going with a paintbrush to the canvas. >> make that paintbrush to terra cotta. inspired by mexican artists such as diego rivera, granizo devotes himself to painting ceramic tiles, an ancient art form. he comes up with his own techniques and secret recipes for his glazes. >> in some ways, this is liquid glass. and you can see that these glazes are very similar in color, so you really don't know what they're gonna turn out to be until you fire them. >> you're saying that, once in the kiln, can turn out and be as bright and beautiful as these? >> absolutely. they go from grays to bright colors. >> how did granizo know what color he was painting with?
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it's not with his eyes, but his fingertips. >> got to the point where he could tell the color by just putting his hand in the glazes just by the thickness. so he'd say, "oh, these are greens. these are reds." and now we're gonna start laying in color by just squeezing this syringe. do you want to try it? >> i do want to try it, but, you know, when i used to color, i could never stay in the lines. this definitely takes time and patience, but after seeing the tile run through the kiln at 2,500 degrees, it's all worth it. wow! look how colorful it is! >> the colors have now been heated up, and they bring the full color to it. >> absolutely beautiful. >> and the process is his. it took him years and years to develop the steps. >> by the early '80s, the great granizo is about to truly arrive on the art scene, ready to make his mark. how important a name is he in ceramic art? >> in my way of thinking, there are no comparables.
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>> that's next. >> but first, our "strange inheritance" quiz question. what performing artist's real name is reginald kenneth dwight? elton john, jamie foxx, or vin diesel? the answer after the break. hi, i'm the internet! you know what's difficult? adulting... tj! get a job! hi, guys. i'm back. time to slay! heals, heals, heals! yes! youuuu! no, i have a long time girlfriend. mom! i need my macaroni!!! you know what's easy? building your website with godaddy. pick a domain name. choose a design. you can build a website in under an hour. yeah! whoo! yes! get your domain today and get a free trial of gocentral. build a better website in under an hour.
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for the record, jamie foxx's real name is eric bishop, and vin diesel's is mark vincent. ♪ >> in the late 1970s, bill wagner quits his 9-to-5, changes his name to guillermo granizo, and becomes a full-time artist. did he live and breathe art? >> yes, 100 percent. >> it was serious to him. he had to paint every single day. ♪ >> he would be in the studio from morning to night, and the whole basement was filled with his artwork. he was just prolific. >> what's so special about this art? >> the man first, the colors second. >> joe taylor is the founder of an organization for lovers of ceramic art, the tile heritage foundation. >> no doubt he was inspired by great artists like picasso, but everything that he created was totally original. >> soon enough,
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the emerging artist is receiving high-profile commissions. by the early '80s, his murals are on display throughout california in napa, monterey, benicia and beyond. >> he always would make six paintings at once. >> incredibly, granizo never uses a sketch while painting his tiles or a blueprint when putting together his murals, many comprised of hundreds upon hundreds of tiles. >> and that, to me, is really one of the miracles of his artwork, the fact that he could conceive of what that whole was going to look like in his head. >> it's enough to make my head spin. >> we're going to try to assemble a pile of tiles that we really don't know if it was a painting, a portrait. want to help? >> i do want to help. well, that looks like a shoulder. oh, the sun is shining, or it's an egg.
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can't tell. okay. don't help. >> okay. >> no, your head doesn't go on your elbow. are you sure these go together? >> it's always a mystery. >> could this be upside down? the man has no head. >> we need a head. >> oh, my! >> and it looks like we're gonna be looking for more tiles. >> now imagine you're in a cherry picker, assembling a mural about the size of a basketball court like this one in los angeles, 24 feet tall and 96 feet long. granizo creates it for the 1984 olympics. at the time, it's the largest tile mural in the world by a single artist. but square footage isn't the only thing that makes it so ambitious. >> what he did was incorporate every single sport in the world that he could on that mural. >> granizo hand-paints more than 2,200 tiles in just 10 weeks. >> and he did it by barely sleeping.
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he had such a passion for doing this mural. he did it day and night. >> he's paid $96,000 for his time and materials. did every penny that would come in go out in supplies? >> yeah. but, you know, that's an artist. it's not for the money. it's for the love. >> soon, granizo's murals are on display around the world -- alaska, japan, spain, and everywhere in between. >> he would smile because he says, "i'm in 40 countries now." >> in 1993, at the age of 70, granizo is diagnosed with lymphoma. >> all he said was, "i've got some drawing to do, and i will beat this because i have no intention of dying." >> he remains defiant, even as his cancer spreads. >> dad, just before he passed, supplied himself with 12 years' worth of supplies. there are hundreds of gallon-buckets of glaze. he just never saw his death coming. >> it comes as granizo finishes
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his final commission, a group of murals for the city of pleasanton, california. >> as we were installing that, he was sitting in a chair off to the side, literally dying. he only had a few weeks left to live. >> but when bill wagner passes away in november 1995 at age 72, he leaves behind much more than guillermo granizo's legacy of public art. there's also a massive body of private works. >> he has thousands of pieces. this is just a fraction of it. >> you weren't kidding. there's more. >> oh, yeah. >> along with a final request for his sons. fulfilling it will be a heavy lift. that's next. >> here's another quiz question for you. what debuted as an olympic sport in the 1984 summer games in los angeles? wind surfing, softball or beach volleyball?
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♪ >> so what debuted as an olympic sport in the 1984 summer games? it's a, wind surfing. softball and beach volleyball arrived in 1996. ♪ >> master tile artist guillermo granizo created thousands of pieces each year. his art is still on display around the globe. after his death in 1995, his sons, ron and bob, inherit their father's vast store of private works. and there's a lot of it! >> this is just a fraction of it.
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there's some more in here, too. >> you weren't kidding. there's more. check out these portraits. there are hundreds of them -- a man caught in the rain, a lonely smoker, and creatures of the night. >> you never know what you're gonna find. >> then there's that set of autobiographical murals. it starts with his childhood when he was traveling through mexico and guatemala. >> this one depicts a dream granizo had as a child. that's him riding a bike across the ocean with robinson crusoe showing him the way. and here's one of him on utah beach on d-day. >> barely made it alive and probably was why he did all this painting all of his life. >> there are 120 of them in all. there's even one that features ron and bob as kids. >> and then, finally, this is the culmination of his decision to be a creative person. >> it would have been a shame if he didn't pursue this, wouldn't it? >> absolutely. >> the brothers find stack
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after stack, box after box, of tiles. some pieces are stand-alone, others, parts of unassembled murals. can you describe the enormity, size-wise, of this inheritance? >> the weight of it all is about 15,000 pounds. >> or nearly 8 tons of artwork. [ elephant trumpets ] do you ever wish there was a little less to inherit? >> the metaphor was, "talk about inheriting some heavy stuff." >> heavy stuff that comes with a hefty price tag. >> i had it appraised 21 years ago, and it was worth about $300,000 at the time. >> cha-ching, assuming the brothers are willing to sell off their dad's work in pieces, but that's an issue. did he tell you what he wanted you to do with all the ceramic tile art? >> one of the things that was always a concern was he never wanted the collections to be broken up. >> not knowing what to do,
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ron and bob do nothing. painted tiles collect dust for the next 21 years. >> but every single day of those 21 years, i thought, "what am i gonna do with it?" >> one of the reasons why i delayed was because i just didn't want to be on the premises. it was sad. >> after ron retires in 2016, the brothers decide it's finally time to deal with the artwork. >> dad would never want these things to be in storage. the big deal is making sure his work endures, is shown, is appreciated. >> and they realize the only way to do that -- split up the tiles and get them into the hands of art lovers. but first, the brothers have to get it all out of dad's house. and with the murals weighing as much as 75 pounds each, that's a heavy burden. excuse me. i got this. come on. you can't lift these. is it bolted to the floor? let's call in the reinforcements. >> you go have a cup of coffee. i'll take care of the rest.
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>> no problem. i'll just let the guys do the lifting. >> twenty-one years' worth of dirt and dust here. okay. there's three. >> only 65 more to go! [ chuckles ] >> yeah. i have to tell you, these are solid. they're not going anywhere. >> with the tiles loaded up and headed to ron's home, the brothers are ready to sell off their strange inheritance to the highest bidders. if only it were that simple. >> there is a big risk when you put artwork out on the market, and you don't know what you're doing. >> that's next. what's your "strange inheritance" story? we'd love to tell it! send me an e-mail or go to our website, strangeinheritance.com. ♪ can i kick it? ♪ yes you can ♪ can i kick it? ♪ yes you can ♪ can i kick it? ♪ yes you can ♪ well i'm gone sfx: road noise sfx: tires screeching
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his sons, ron and bob, are trying to sell the thousands of painted tiles they inherited from their dad. what makes you think there's a market for his unique style of ceramic tile art? >> we're trying to find out what the market is. neither one of us have sold art before. >> there is a big risk when you put artwork out on the market, and you don't know what you're doing. >> makayla van swoll is a fine art adviser who's helping ron and bob with their strange inheritance. >> you can burn an artwork, and you can definitely put your values at risk. >> granizo's private artwork was appraised for $300,000 20 years ago. but makayla tells the brothers that means little today. >> an appraisal is never fixed. it's just like the stock market. something could happen tomorrow, and poof, all of a sudden, it'll be highly valuable or not at all. it really depends on how the heirs decide to develop his estate. >> she urges ron and bob
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to get their dad's name and artwork back into the public conversation. >> it will help them to reestablish a presence in the san francisco bay area, develop a market for the artist's work that hopefully will grow. >> the heirs begin to display his murals across the bay area, including at the benicia historical museum. >> they said they were going do an entire art gallery based around dad's work. >> they also make a deal for a book featuring granizo's private works. >> so the book seems to be the only way that it will be held as a collection forever. >> and they donate a favorite self-portrait of their dad to the city of pleasanton to be put on permanent display in the same park as their father's final commission. the mural is unveiled at a ceremony attended by city officials and friends of granizo. ♪ [ applause ]
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>> this, to me, has been his memorial. so we're very proud to donate this. >> when he could not make his dedication 21 years ago, he sent ron and i to tell you, in his place, thank you. he would love it if we could get more of it out there for people to enjoy. >> and remember that dozen years' worth of supplies he ordered right before his death? they're not going to waste. >> there has never been a loss for people calling for his work, so with maybe 5,000 square feet of tile ready to be painted on, the kilns, all the glazes, we're gonna reopen the granizo studio and see what we can do. >> that's right. bob, an artist himself, is replicating his father's style and creating some new granizo-inspired tiles. >> how does it feel to be following dad's footsteps? >> i was apprehensive at first. really didn't want to walk back into the studio after years of missing him. it feels good now,
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feels real good. >> it's one more step to ensure their father's legacy won't be forgotten. how does it make you feel when you know your father has art that's everlasting, really? >> oh, it's fabulous. he used to say, "it took 2,500 degrees to make this tile. at the end of the world, it may not be that hot. my art will be still standing." >> after completing this mural that depicts his near fatal injuries sustained on utah beach, granizo wrote, "suppose that there is heaven. would i go there since i give beauty to the world? yes. i would go to heaven, where an angel would bring me my tiles. a second would hand me my tools. another would mix buckets of glaze, and still another would rush the tiles to hell, where they would be fired." here's hoping the great artist is still busy painting tiles and working the kiln. i'm jamie colby.
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thanks so much for watching "strange inheritance." and remember -- you can't take it with you. the train to break in this. change of heart? president trump initially backing away from a bipartisan deal to save a life of obamacare. the push for tax cuts continues. lauren: the harvey one team scandal continues to shock hollywood. now his brother bob is facing allegations of sexual harassment as well. trying to get at your party hats. the 23,000 level for the first time ever during yesterday's session. open about 23,000 today. future's looking like it's going to happen.
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