I wasn’t loving the Sol LeWitt sculpture exhibit as it was being installed in City Hall Park. I was prepared to mock them as pen nibs, flan molds, and modular shelving—many of the works do resemble those things—and I particularly didn’t like the cinder-block ones. Are you ever excited to see cinder block? Mostly, as I said to the folks at One Art Space this morning, I think public art should be less conceptual—if you don’t know much about modern art or Sol LeWitt, can you get much from these works?

I just went over to take some photos to prove my point, thinking only the multicolored outlier would hold my interest, when I was surprised by how good the white ones looked—even the cinder block one on the western lawn. Maybe the park has turned greener, or the light was really making them pop, but they demanded (and deserved) attention; this was especially true of the ones on the grass. In fact, the color sculpture—which totally resembles the “adjust” icon in iPhoto—struck me as the weakest, except for the cinder-block pyramid on the eastern plaza. Then again, there’s enough crap surrounding it (a sidewalk artist, an “art” vendor, and tour groups) that it faded away. Or maybe compared to the Verizon building nothing looks bad.

As for whether non-art aficionados will dig the exhibit, I ran into a friend who asked who Sol Le Witt was—and she was enjoying it quite a bit. Waiter, that’ll be two orders of crow….

The show will be up through Dec. 2, so you have ample time to check it out. But I suggest going when there’s still a touch of spring green in the park—and before the birds, squirrels, and general New York City grime take their toll, despite the best efforts of the squirt-bottle-toting workers milling around today.