Poet’s Walk: Overall

Lawrence Weiner | Los Angeles

Arts LA Overall sign

Location: FIGat7th, 735 S. Figueroa Street, Los Angeles, CA 90017

About the work

Lawrence Weiner is considered one of the central figures in the development of Post-minimalist conceptual art, a movement where the idea that informs an artwork should take precedence over its visual characteristics and attributes.

For Overall, Weiner worked with poet Carolyn Kizer. The installation sits over a walkway at the FIGat7th upper plaza. The repetition of the words inscribed in the copper plate was meant to mirror the constant cycling of the escalators below. The structure of the piece is reminiscent of New York’s Elevated Lines (Weiner’s home) while also symbolizing a gateway through which the viewer moves, travels, and can be reminded of the overall importance of what is said.

Influential American artist Lawrence Weiner (b. 1942) is known for his language-based sculptures and works pursuing inquiries into language and the artist/viewer relationship. Considering language to be a sculptural material and believing that a construction in language can function as sculpture as adequately as a fabricated object, Weiner’s works operate beyond the specificity and constraints of traditional presentation. He currently lives and works in New York.