From Dutch Workshops to Conceptual Art

In Adriaen van Ostade’s etching The Painter in His Studio, lit by large, multi-paned windows, the artist works at his easel. His studio is littered with painting materials, a small nude statuette, and books—items to aid his artistic practice. However, underneath the winding staircase, partly in the shadows, two assistants mix pigments for their master’s paint. Artists since the Middle Ages operated within a workshop system where they enlisted apprentices to aid in the creation of works. The master of the workshop oversaw projects and typically took on the most centrally important parts of the artworks, divvying up the other components among his apprentices. This practice continued throughout the Renaissance. Even today, many of the world’s most famous artists, such as Jeff Koons and Ai Weiwei, rely on the labor of teams of hired assistants.

However, in Western art since the Renaissance, artists have been understood as unique individuals—geniuses with highly original ways of viewing the world. Artists from Michelangelo to Andy Warhol are thought of as standalone figures, but were in fact assisted by others. Sol LeWitt’s Incomplete Open Cube 8-14, 1974 is an example of an artistic practice that not only made use of the labor of others, but also embraced this as a part of the art-making process. The Hood’s Incomplete Open Cube was purchased from the artist’s gallery in 1975. The work was subjected to some wear and tear during its life in the museum, and in the mid-nineties, the artist’s studio instructed the Hood to take it to a body shop to be refurbished. LeWitt was a conceptual artist who posited that the idea behind a work of art took precedence over the artwork’s material form. He supplied instructions and diagrams about how to make certain works, such as wall drawings and sculptures, but did not execute them himself. Where the artist was once thought of as a person who physically makes a work of art, now the artist is a person who creates the idea of a work of art. 

LeWitt’s wall drawings most clearly illustrate the artist’s reliance on the labor of others to create his art. LeWitt created thousands of works that consisted simply of written instructions and diagrams for others to draw out and create. These works occupy the walls of museums and galleries all over the world today. However, all of these works are labeled as Sol LeWitt’s, regardless of whoever physically makes them.