Liberating Structures: Non-Visual Systems in the Art of Sol LeWitt

Abstract

LIBERATING STRUCTURES, NON-VISUAL SYSTE~IS IN TIlE ART OF SOL LEWITT Mette Gieskes is a dOClOral s!udclII illlilc Dcpartmcnr ofAn and Arr His/ory. Ullil'CrsiZI' of Texas. AIISlill. ln the tumultuous decade of the 19605. various anists. composers. authors. :md film directors chose to base their \\'orks on predetermined systems as a means of 3voiding convention. rcpresentation, and personal habit. They sclecled a sel of rules Ihm \Vere strictl)' followed during the cxecution of the \Vork. These syslem·based works secm particularly self-referen!Ia!. )'e1 the systemic generators \Vere frequently imponed from other fields: composer Pierre Boulez based Structure la for t 'o pianos on a \\'ork of Paul Klee. Alain Robbe-Grillet based Iwo movIes on seriaI and aleatorv structures encountered in contemporar)' music. l the writers associated with the O~lipo Group subjeeted their work to fonnal panerns from mathematics and chess. and Sol LeWin investigated the liberating em'cts for art of architectural. musical. and narrative structures. Why were sa many artists at this especiaJly turbulent moment in histo!)' interested in systems? 1 argue that the employment of systemic structures. which are inherently a----centric and non--hierarehical. not only provided an alternative to the more expressionist art from the immediate pa st-for yisual artists this \Vas abstract expressionism--but in a less obvious manner also reflected a rejection of the cstablished order of society. 1 further propose that the adoption of systems from other mediums added an extra libcTating dimension to the alread)' liberating effect of the systemic as sHch. serving ta preyent r('cession into a convenlional usage of the medium. The focus of this paper is the work of American visual anist Sol LeWin, a su il able figure for the subjeci of this collection perhaps especially because of the interplay in his work of image and texl, and his belief Ihal ideas in themselves can be \Vorks of art. whether they be gi\'en visual, verbal. aurai shape, or no fonn al aIl. His few but influential writings from the late 1960s, most notably Paragraphs on Conceplual Art and Sentences on Conceptua! An:' are indeed best known for describing and promoling a kind ofart thal is based on ideas mther tnar: on fOim. Since 1965, LeWin has b::tsed his structures, walldrawings. and prints on a simple idea. such as Variations of Incomplete Open Cubes (1974). Before cxecuting. or giving physical shape 10 the artwork. LeWin wmild come up with a set of verbal instructions. or rules. that he himself or his assistants were ta follow closely. Although the idea ilself is often logical. the physical m::tnifestation is generally perceptually illogical. and hard to analvz.e in the absence of a verbal description or schematic plan.~ ln order to conceive Ihe system behind the haphazard appeaTancc of the piece. the viewer has to becomc memally cngaged to fmd the key to the system, just as in detective stories-which LeWin lil.:ed ta read-the reader unravels the puzzle by actively analyzing and correlating the clues. 3 1 have chosen. however. to focus not on the idea---and language--oriemedness of lcWitt s art, nor on the delicate and dynamic encounter of idea, word. and image in his ork. but to conccntrnte instead on the less thoroughly examined l'ole of systems in the artist's \York of the 1960s and early '70s.