Sol LeWitt. Lary Bloom
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be sure, of images of the sixth president at the time in terms of the facial shape, hair, and so on. But the young LeWitt’s portrait of Monroe added elements showing that at an early age the artist had begun to form ideas about the world. It shows Monroe as the mastermind of the Monroe Doctrine, standing tall on a map of America that features a sign: “Warning!! You are now entering the Western Hemisphere…. Leave Guns and Knives at Home.” In this drawing, the United States is surrounded by a fence with its posts dug into the ocean. That ocean was also a theme for him in the sense that historic boats became subjects for his work. There are pencil sketches of a Spanish warship, the Matthew of Bristol (similar to the Santa Maria), an English warship of 1560, and a Roman warship dated 60 B.C.E. All of the vessels were sailing, perhaps, from landlocked New Britain. Unlike some of the other work, these maritime images have a great amount of detail. An observer studying LeWitt’s ships and the intricate if much more abstract designs that emerged in his art decades later might conclude that the artist’s mature vision of art began to develop in childhood.
In the summer between his junior and senior years of high school, Solly worked at manual labor he despised. He spent his free time expanding his views, commenting on present-day world affairs—which were dominated, of course, by World War II.
This sixteen-year-old, who had never traveled beyond the boundaries of Connecticut, had sophisticated ideas. A cartoon he drew on August 13, 1944, shows the metaphorical ship Germania sinking, with a few people on board representing Hungary, Bulgaria, and Finland. Private LeWitt’s advice appeared below: “You’d better jump while you’ve got the chance.” A few days later, Solly drew Hitler with his hands to his head and the Grim Reaper about to hand him a death cocktail. The title of the drawing was The Day of Reckoning.
But subtlety and a grasp of how people acquire and retain power were also evident. In another August 1944 drawing, Solly shows two German men in suits talking about the war. The death camps had recently been discovered, and news of disappearing Jews had certainly reached 51 Cedar Street. One of the men in the drawing whispers to the other: “I never would have imagined. Goodness.” The other whispers back: “Und der Russians vant to Communize the United States und Britain—and the Jews vere the only vons to profit in the war. And that’s not all …” Below is a quote attributed to Hitler: “When you tell them a lie, tell them a big one.” Perhaps the most sophisticated drawing from that breakthrough summer shows an American businessman in a stupor, popping his vest buttons and railing, “Down with Russia, down with England, let the rest of the world go to hell.” The title was “Hitler’s Rear Guard—The Isolationist.”
Mort Jaffe, one of Solly’s high school friends, doesn’t remember these drawings. Jaffe recalls only the European piece that hung near the kitchen table at 51 Cedar Street. He didn’t know who had drawn it, but he didn’t like it. It was sketchier, not intended to be representational, in the manner of schools of art that emerged after the impressionist period: “It was an ink drawing. A lot of white. It didn’t make sense to me, as compared to Rembrandts.”32
Jaffe was at the house because Sophie LeWitt, whom he recalls as being “a very liberal parent,” was the only mother in the neighborhood who allowed the boys to play seven-card stud poker any time they wanted. They came in not through the living room door but through the back door, “in the European fashion,” Jaffe recalls. “We played there maybe twice a week. Five of us—Wilbur K. Williams, Bill Rachlin, Samuel Abrahamson, Sol, and me. Only we never in those days called him Sol. We knew him as Saul. Just Saul. Like the king. I was surprised years later when his name was spelled S-O-L, because I never knew him that way.”33
Friedenberg, who several decades later became publisher of the Cincinnati Enquirer, said: “Why did I like Sol? Because he was quiet, reserved, good-natured, witty and Jewish—and I was taught at home to be friendly and nonprejudiced toward Negroes and Jews.” He offered the following reminiscence:
It was an early fall day, probably a Saturday, as I recall, when we were in 9th or 10th grade. Ten or a dozen schoolmates—boys only of course—would gather in Walnut Hill Park for a game of touch football….
One day, for the first time, Sol showed up to play. I was surprised because he was conspicuously non-athletic, but I was glad to see him, as were the others. He was on the opposing team from mine and like me was a lineman, blocking and tagging the runner when we could. He seemed to be not quite in a flow of play, doubtless because he was the only one of us wearing eyeglasses, and they were of a definitely unfashionable rimless kind.
It started to rain lightly, but of course we kept playing, like real football teams do. Our hair, our clothing, our shoes, the grass, the ball all got wet, but we played on. Then on the next play, Sol and I were on the scrimmage line facing each other, and I noticed that the rain had coated his glasses with water, and I thought, “Heck, how can he SEE?” Yet he was still in there, playing with all his heart. My esteem for Sol went up.
Then, after the game was over, Sol invited me to his home, and I was pleased and accepted. It was an unpretentious apartment in a small building on a side street near the park. We were greeted by his mother, a kindly woman who continually gave me a blissful, serene smile and served me and Sol a cup of hot chocolate and a pastry with nuts and apples. She didn’t say much but seemed very pleased that Sol had invited me to their home. I didn’t say long because I had to get home.
It was only when we were in the army and became solid friends, Sol told me his mother was a nurse and that his father, a doctor, had died when was just starting school. I thought then that maybe [the reason] Mrs. LeWitt smiled so much was that she was pleased that Sol had a friend.34
However, Solly’s schoolwork during this time was certainly not up to Sophie’s expectations, as she held onto her hopes that he would eventually decide to go to medical school. His final grades for his junior year, 1943–44, were:
English: B
Physics: C
French 1: C
Chemistry: B
American history: A
His grades improved somewhat in his senior year, when he had the chance to take electives—including, for the first time, the field in which he would excel:
English (college prep): B
Physical education: A
Physics: C
Art: A
Latin American history: A35
The report cards reveal his two lasting passions: art and history. What they don’t necessarily show was his emerging interest in international affairs. At some point in high school, he entered an essay contest. How he fared isn’t clear, but essay is still in existence. In it is a deep sense of humility and questioning that would become one of LeWitt’s trademarks:
Not the kind that preaches that everyone should love me, but that which teaches each to love all…. A tolerant person sees at once all sides of a question and at the same time sees the right one. That which benefits the greatest number of people. A tolerant person does not consider himself any better than his associates and his race and nation no better than his neighbors. Freedom and peace follow naturally from tolerance. It sounds simple but it is the most difficult of things to do. Men’s minds are hard to change, especially when they live in the past.36
The essay is astonishing for its maturity and the glimpse it provides into the artist’s career and personal values. In arguing for the spirit of tolerance, he refers to what would become a lifelong quest. In addition, a reader of the entire essay would see a fierce originality in it—unlike the bar mitzvah speech a few years earlier, which seemed more scripted. Solly understood complexity but at the same time argued that complexity should be no impediment to righteous action. This is early evidence of his independent thought and an indication, in his assertion that he doesn’t need to be loved by everyone, that he understands going along with the crowd can take an unthinking person in the wrong direction.
When Solly entered the essay contest, friends assumed that if he won he wouldn’t want to read his work aloud at an assembly.