Pogačnik was born on 11 August 1944 in Kranj. He entered the world of art in his grammar school years producing drawings and sculpting natural rock. With his friends I. Geister and M. Ciglič he began publishing the Plamenica (Torch) school newspaper at his grammar school in Kranj. He studied sculpture at the Ljubljana Academy of Fine Arts (1963-1967, graduating from the class of Prof. Zdenko Kalin). Together with I. Geister he founded the OHO movement (1964-1971) and became its leading figure both in the spiritual and organisational sense (cf. OHO). The OHO experience was followed by a period spent in the rural Family (Družina) commune in Šempas (1971-1978). From 1979 to 1986 he created a series of landscape sculptures in the Vipava and Soča valleys. Since 1986 he has been engaged in "Healing the Earth" projects creating a series of sculptural installations (a sculptural installation in Langenbroich near Düren, 1985-1986, lithopuncture of the Türnich park near Cologne, 1986-1989, lithopunctures and sculptural installations for Cappenberg near Dortmund from 1988 onwards, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland in 1992, and others). Since 1982 he has been conducting workshops and seminars, he lectures and writes about his experience in connecting life and art, and he also conducts research into the relations between man and natural spheres. In 1991 he received the Prešeren Fund Award. He has written a number of books, among which are A Hidden Pathway Through Venice (Rome: Carucci Editore, 1986); Zmajeve črte, ekologija in umetnost (Maribor: Založba Obzorja/Zbirka Znamenja, 1986); Ljubljanski trikotnik (Ljubljana: Založba Domus, 1988); Die Erde heilen. Das Modell Trnich (Munich: Eugen Diederichs Verlag, 1989); Za zdravljenje zemlje (Ljubljana: Državna založba Slovenije, 1991); Ko se boginja vrne (Ljubljana: Iskanja, 1993).