A reproduction of the instructions for LeWitt's 'Wall Drawing #118.' (Courtesy SMFA Boston)

Sol LeWitt apparently did not enjoy public speaking so when he stopped by the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 1971, as a visiting artist and lecturer, he proposed making a drawing with the students instead of giving a lecture.

That story comes from the announcement card for "Something Along Those Lines," a show now up at the SMFA. Its front has the instructions for the piece as he laid them out in an exhibition catalogue from the same year. Look at that handsome, poetic design:

"On a wall surface, any
continuous stretch of wall,
using a hard pencil, place
fifty points at random.
The points should be evenly
distributed over the area
of the wall. All of the
points should be connected
by straight lines. "

"Something Along Those Lines" includes work by Fred Sandback, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Sol LeWitt and others, and runs through Nov. 3.