Dimensions: image: 609 x 603 mm
Copyright: © The estate of Sol LeWitt | CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 DEED, Photo: Tate
Editor: This striking, untitled image by Sol LeWitt features a cube rendered in stark black and white lines. The repetition is almost hypnotic. What do you see in this piece, beyond the geometric form? Curator: I see the cube as a potent symbol, echoing ancient architectural forms, like ziggurats. The black lines could represent bars, evoking feelings of confinement or conversely, order. Does the pattern remind you of anything familiar? Editor: It does, like an optical illusion or the bars of a cage. It's unsettling and orderly. Curator: Exactly. LeWitt's work often plays with these visual tensions. It's a structure holding meaning, a cultural echo chamber. Editor: I'll definitely think about structures differently now.
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All of LeWitt's work embraces some kind of system. Here, he uses the frame of a cube to generate a series of geometric shapes. This sequence shows five shapes, but the possible permutations that could be drawn out of a cube are almost limitless. The prints are not made by LeWitt, but by assistants according to his instructions. By minimising his physical presence in the process of fabrication, LeWitt emphasises the importance of the concept behind the work. 'The idea becomes a machine that makes the art', he has said. Gallery label, August 2004