Since first meeting in NewYork in 1974, Sol LeWitt and Irene Barberis maintained a friendship that spanned decades. LeWitt’s mentorship and his ongoing influence and presence in her work led to her 2019 residencies in LeWitt’s studios: Chester, USA,
Spoleto and Praiano, Italy.
In the Chester studio Barberis documented all that she saw creating over 800 artworks that form part of the ongoing international LeWitt/Barberis research project.
The first of two volumes records Barberis’ three-month stay in the Chester Studio.
It reproduces some of her thousands of photographs in a format inspired by LeWitt’s own gridded photo essays and is the first complete published documentation of the space.
Collectors, artists and historians will delight in Barberis’ unique ‘camera and brush’ responses to LeWitt’s Chester studio space. The intimate nature of Barberis’ undertaking is echoed by personal observations by Lucy R. Lippard, author and friend of LeWitt, and Janet Passehl, artist and curator of the LeWitt Collection.
