Solomon "Sol" LeWitt

Modernism- "art, architecture and design which self-consciously rejected the past as a model for the art of the present." - http://www.tate.org.uk/collections/glossary/definition.jsp?entryId=174 . I looked at the work of Sol LeWitt because his work is an example of minimalism and his work is referenced in the BAS7 exhibition. However Sol LeWitt's work is actualy an example of postmodernism I feel that it still reflects modernist veiws as postmodernism developed from modernism. In his work he would often use teams of people which links to the interest in industry in modernism and links to the way in which modernist artists used industrial process and other people to create artwork.


In his sculptural work, as seen above, he uses the necker cube to form structures that reference the cantileaver system. Although it is almost an oposite to abstract expressionism, for example the work of Jackson Pollock, it reflects the modernist veiw that the asthetic of a product is dervived from its structural integrity. I feel Sol LeWitts work also links to changes in society after the war, the way in which rehousing schemes and factory based industry created housing blocks to house those who had lost their homes, through the use of the repetition of a shape to visualise the way in which tower blocks are made of rooms stacked upon each other to create space.


Sol LeWitt's work is reference in the BAS7 exhibition by Simon Martin through a series of photographs of one of Sol LeWitt's sculptures, similar to the one photographed above. I looked at this because I was interested in the way Sol LeWitt's work and influence effects art today.


"Every generation renews itself in its own way; there's always a reaction against whatever is standard" - Sol LeWitt

This quote by Sol LeWitt references the way in which Modernism was a reaction against the conservative values of realism. Realism was the standard in art practise, Modernist artists reacted to this by rejecting traditional art practise. They welcomed the idustrializing world into their practise through Ready-Mades and referencing their art to popular culture and consumerism. Sol LeWitts minimalist work rejected the standard by rejecting the idea of of relational and subjective painting through using simple forms to create artwork.