Since the early part of his career, Robert Ryman has restricted himself to the color white. As part of the Minimalist movement prominent in the 1960s-mid 1970s, he narrowed his palette because “he didn’t want anything in the paintings that didn’t need to be there”. The essential ingredients of painting, those things that cannot be done without, become the works most critical aspects. For Ryman, these essentials are medium (oil, baked enamel, emulsion, etc.), support (canvas, linen, paper, metal, fiberglass), and even the way the work is affixed to the wall. The most important element of painting, however, is the act of laying down paint. Ryman is often quoted as saying, “There is never a question of what to paint, but only how to paint. The how of painting has always been the image--the end product.”

Ironically, the more Ryman reduced his work to material conventions, the more the work seemed to express immaterial values. The use of white unavoidably causes light to interact with the work. Ryman’s mastery of the color has resulted in a white so complex it can suggest all colors. His experimental hanging techniques have resulted in white squares that seem to float in space, adding a spectral or spiritual quality. By deconstructing all the romantic and stylized aspects of painting so completely, the elements left behind--paint and surface--have been revealed as lyrical and enigmatic objects in their own right.