NARRATOR: 

This painting is called Wall. And if it seems crooked to you, you’re right and you’re wrong. Because it’s hung straight. But it looks…off.  

SFX: MUSIC – slightly tense sound of repeating, discordant music, it seems to be toying with us, winking at us between thoughts throughout the stop  

SARAH ROBERTS:  

What are my issues with this painting?  

NARRATOR (whispered, conspiratorially):  

See, curators have issues too.  

ROBERTS:  

If you walk into a gallery or your home and there’s a framed picture on the wall and it’s sitting just ever so slightly crooked, most of us would probably go over and straighten it up.  

NARRATOR [playfully, underneath breath]:  

Just a tad lower on the right…  

SFX: MUSIC plink, beat of silence, as if everything is resolved 

ROBERTS:  

And this is a painting that can’t be straightened.  

SFX: Discordance returns 

ROBERTS:  

So it is kind of toying with us and our sense of propriety. It will never be straight. There’s nothing we can do to fix it.  

SFX: Music note seems to laugh or wink at us 

NARRATOR:  

But why would Ellsworth Kelly make a crooked painting?  

KELLY:  

I wanna leave something open. And that business of leaving something open is very hard for people to like.  

ROBERTS:  

I think he’s offering an opportunity for you to just pause for a moment and think about the way your eyes see shapes in space. If you take the time to kind of let your eyes quiet down and ask something different of a painting, this is one that has all kinds of interesting things to say.  

SFX: Winking music fades