Wall Drawing 552D

Tilted forms with color ink washes superimposed.

December 1987

Color ink wash

Courtesy of the Estate of Sol LeWitt

First Installation
Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh

First Drawn By
David Higginbotham, Linda Taylor, Jo Watanabe

MASS MoCA Building 7
Second Floor

Wall Drawing 552D is a part of the body of wall drawings presenting a figure the artist described as “not quite a cube.” Despite their volumetric appearance, these forms adhere as much to the idea of flatness as Sol LeWitt’s linear geometries. The 8” black borders around this drawing in particular recalls the boundaries of the artist’’s oft-used grid format, only here the frame frustrates rather than facilitates the perception of its contents. Interrupting the uppermost surface of the tilted solid, the border counteracts the sensation of illusionistic space and, consequently, accentuates the wall’’s flatness.

Critics have made reference to early fresco painters as an inspiration for LeWitt’’s use of color. Much like how LeWitt employs isometric projection, he recalls an older color sensibility while inflecting it with his signature system of superimposing—, rather than mixing —pigments.