SOL LEWITT

Provenance:
- Private collection Sweden.
- Sotheby's, London, auction 25 March 1993, lot 365.
- Private collection Europe.
- Sotheby's London, auction 12 April 2017, lot 21.
- Purchased from the above by the present owner, since then private collection Switzerland.

There has been scarcely any other artist who has left his imprint on the development of American art like Sol LeWitt, one of the most important pioneers of Minimalism and Conceptual art. The numerous variations on cubes and the large-format murals brought world-wide renown to the son of Jewish immigrants from Russia.

The artist began his career as a draughtsman and graphic artist, initially focusing on the design of strictly geometric forms for interior decoration. In the 1960s, LeWitt developed his own characteristic style with a minimalist reduction to colour, form and structure, putting the idea, or rather the concept, before execution.

Sol LeWitt explained his increasing use of the cube which he employed as the basic building block for his works, as follows: "The most interesting characteristic of the cube is that it is relatively uninteresting. Compared to any other three–dimensional form, the cube lacks any aggressive force, implies no motion, and is least emotive. Therefore, it is the best form to use as a basic unit for any more elaborate function, the grammatical device from which the work may proceed."