# @drawingcenter on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/BFW3KjrR19s
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/16048834-drawingcenter-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/thumbnails/782a6a7527.jpg
- **Posted:** 2016-05-13T18:18:33.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** The Drawing Center (@drawingcenter) — https://gondola.cc/drawingcenter

## Caption

Baldessari, on mixing chance and order in his work: "The benefit is that one does not have to think about creating something beautiful. Beauty may or may not be a result, but that’s not the point.” --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
John Baldessari’s series of conceptual photographs, “Throwing Three Balls in the Air to Get a Straight Line (Best of Thirty-Six Attempts)”, 1973, documents the artist’s failures to realize an impractical task. The photographs, which were included in an artist book by the same name, each depict three orange balls floating in a blue Los Angeles sky. Like many of Baldessari’s photographic series from the early 1970s, “Throwing Three Balls in the Air to Get a Straight Line” was created by combining chance operations and a set of highly-regulated rules—for instance, the number of tries the artist allowed himself (thirty-six) was determined by the number of photographs available on a roll of 35mm film. 
#LeWittCollection #JohnBaldessari 
Image: John Baldessari, “Throwing Three Balls in the Air to Get a Straight Line (Best of Thirty-Six Attempts)”, 1973. Twelve offset photographs, 9 3/4 x 12 7/8 inches each. Courtesy of the artist. Photograph by RJ Phil.

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## Tags

lewittcollection, johnbaldessari

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