Robert Ryman may be considered the philosopher of the reductivist aesthetic that came to the fore in New York in the late 1960's and within a decade established itself as the worldwide movement called Minimalism. Ryman is known for his white paintings--a monochrome palette that would, at first glance, seem so restrictive that it doesn't allow for much in the way of expression or meaning to come through. Yet, for Ryman, white "was chosen not for its mystical or symbolic qualities but because it revealed more clearly than colour the inherent possibilities of the medium" (S. Bann, Brice Marden: Paintings, Drawings and Prints 1975-1980, London 1981, p. 8).

Like a philosopher, Ryman's investigations

test what an analytical inquiry can do to that category of our perceptions called painting...His approach is anti-'expressive' in the extreme, and yet, mysteriously, in his work something does get expressed...With a sober, oddly sweet playfulness, Ryman makes all necessary decisions for a painting in advance, methodically carries them out, and then, in effect, stands back to see what happened. Something rather compelling always has (P. Schjeldahl, Art of Our Time: The Saatchi Collection, London 1984, p. 26).