(b Hartford, CT, 9 Sept 1928; d New York, NY, 8 April 2007).
American sculptor, printmaker and draughtsman. . . . From 1955 to 1956 he worked as a graphic designer for the architect I. M. Pei, and he began to make paintings while continuing to work as a graphic designer. He abandoned painting in 1962 and began to make abstract black-and-white reliefs, followed in 1963 by relief constructions with nested enclosures projecting into space, and box- and table-like constructions. He first made serial and modular works, for which he is best known, in 1965. Initially these were wall and floor structures, but in 1968 LeWitt made his first wall drawing in pencil on plaster, at the Paula Cooper Gallery, New York. From that time he continued to make structures, wall drawings and drawings on paper as well as prints, which he first made in 1971. LeWitt’s work, like that of other Minimalist and conceptual artists, stressed idea over execution. For each work a system was worked out in advance, which could then be executed by an assistant as easily as by the artist.
Jeremy Lewison