Coloring Sol’s Walls

No crayons needed …

All images © 2021 Chris Culy

Coloring Sol's Walls pattern

(1) CSW, pattern only

I was looking at some of my old fun projects the other day, and one of them struck me in a new way. In Zio Chris’ Wall Drawing 256 I took took off from one of Sol Lewitt‘s conceptual Wall Drawings, writing a program that generates a small subset of the possibilities in Lewitt’s instructions for Wall Drawing 358. There are lots of tricky things about Wall Drawings, but that’s not surprising since Lewitt intended them as conceptual art, where the idea is more important than the realization(s).

The image above shows something similar to a Wall Drawing 358. We could debate whether it is a Wall Drawing 358, or even a Zio Chris’ Wall Drawing 256, but let’s set that aside. I will note, however, that the lines in (1) are not circular arcs (which is arguably implicit in Lewitt’s directions), but rather parabolas. Up until the other day, which coincidentally was April 8, the anniversary of Lewitt’s death, I always saw just the lines in Wall Drawings. But then Thursday I saw the shapes formed by the lines, and wondered what they would look like colored in. Here’s one answer for that pattern in (1).

 

Coloring Sol's Walls pattern filled

(2) CSW, pattern and fills

Coloring in the figures gives me a completely different impression of (2). While (1) is cool and detached, (2) is warm and organic. Below are a few more examples, the second two of which use a different color palette. Or you can just stop fidgeting and go make your own on my page.

 

Color Sol's Walls Example 1

(3) CSW #1

 

Color Sol's Walls Example 2

(4)  CSW #2

 

Color Sol's Walls Example 3

(5)  CSW #3

 

Color Sol's Walls Example 4

(6)  CSW #4