For nearly five decades, starting in the early 1960s, Sol LeWitt was at the forefront of minimal and conceptual art. LeWitt's structures (a term he preferred to sculpture) are generally composed with modular, quasi-architectural forms. For Four-Sided Pyramid, as with many of his works, LeWitt created a plan and a set of instructions to be executed by others. In collaboration with the artist, a team of engineers and stonemasons constructed Four-Sided Pyramid on this site. The terraced pyramid, first employed by LeWitt in the 1960s, relates to the 1961 repeal of early 20th-century setback laws for New York City skyscrapers. The geometric structure of Four-Sided Pyramid also alludes to the ziggurats of ancient Mesopotamia.