Last week, I had t
During the week, each location hosts a group of twenty-five instructors for one day of discussions and projects for CPE credits. It was a fun, thought-provoking, and intense experience! Everyone made two dimensional works of art using only cloth, plastic, paper, stitch witchery, and heated irons at the Warehouse. Teachers toured an installation project in the Vickery Meadows neighborhood with the Nasher Artist-In-Residence, Rick Lowe. At the DMA we explored artist-induced meaning through blurring images in the style of Gerhard Richter, and examined institution-created meaning by becoming curators. In Fort Worth, we created grid-like Minimalist art at The Modern, and painted Japanese screens at the Kimbell.
The results of one activity were quite interesting: during our day at the Modern we examined Sol LeWitt’s Wall Drawing #50, in which the artist created a drawing and set of instructions for any installers to finish the work at a different location. In this work of conceptual art, the instructions themselves are the work of art; the installation of it is simply an extension and realization of this idea. (While visually very different from the Modern’s, LeWitt’s process here is similar to the one he used in the DMA’s Wall Drawing #398, installed in the barrel vault.)
We were inspired to create our own work of conceptual paper drawing by creating a set of instructions resembling an “official” certificate designating the instructions as the work of art. Then we handed our instructions to another participant who had to become the “installer” and draw our image based on the instructions.
1. Hold a pencil.
2. Spin around thirty-nine times.
3. Try to draw thirty-nine straight parallel lines on a sheet of paper situated vertically (on a wall or easel).
4. After a thirty-nine second break, hold a pencil in your non-dominant hand.
5. Draw thirty-nine straight lines with your non-dominant hand that cross the first set of lines at a ninety-degree angle.
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Artwork shown:
- Sol LeWitt, Wall Drawing #398, 1983 (installed 1985), Dallas Museum of Art, gift of The 500, Inc., Mr. and Mrs. Michael J. Collins and Mr. and Mrs. James L. Stephenson, Jr.