On a Blue Ceiling, Eight Geometric Figures: Circle, Trapezoid, Parallelogram, Rectangle, Square, Triangle, Right Triangle, X (Wall Drawing No. 351)

Gallery 274, Modern and Contemporary Art, second floor (Tuttleman Gallery)

Main Building

On a Blue Ceiling, Eight Geometric Figures: Circle, Trapezoid, Parallelogram, Rectangle, Square, Triangle, Right Triangle, X (Wall Drawing No. 351)

1981

Sol LeWitt (American, 1928–2007)

LeWitt never touched this ceiling; there is nothing of his handcraft in its production. Rather, what was important to him was the idea--he was an early pioneer of conceptual art. In 1982, the Philadelphia Museum of Art purchased this wall drawing, which means simply that the Museum owns the idea and the right to execute it or to erase it and to allow others to do so, as expressed in a certificate signed by the artist. LeWitt provided the description that is the work's title and specified directions (how many coats and what brand of paint, for example), but the execution of the wall drawing was left to the hands of others.

Gallery 274, Modern and Contemporary Art, second floor (Tuttleman Gallery)

Object Details

Title:

On a Blue Ceiling, Eight Geometric Figures: Circle, Trapezoid, Parallelogram, Rectangle, Square, Triangle, Right Triangle, X (Wall Drawing No. 351)

Date:

1981

Artist:

Sol LeWitt (American, 1928–2007)

Medium:

Wall drawing (Chalk and latex paint on plaster)

Dimensions:

Dimensions variable; as currently installed: 15 feet 6 inches × 54 feet 7 inches (472.4 × 1663.7 cm)

Classification:

Installation Art

Credit Line:

Purchased with a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and with funds contributed by Mrs. H. Gates Lloyd, Mr. and Mrs. N. Richard Miller, Mrs. Donald A. Petrie, Eileen and Peter Rosenau, Mrs. Adolf Schaap, Frances and Bayard Storey, Marion Boulton Stroud, and two anonymous donors (by exchange), with additional funds from Dr. and Mrs. William Wolgin, the Daniel W. Dietrich Foundation, and the Friends of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1982

Accession Number:

1982-121-1a,b

Geography:

Made in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, North and Central America

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Gallery 274, Modern and Contemporary Art, second floor (Tuttleman Gallery)

Main Building

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