"The work of Robert Ryman is historically in line with the abstraction of Malevich, Mondrian, Newman, Rothko and Reinhardt,...but Ryman's work nonetheless comes to us unburdened by the myths, manifestos, or protective irony that clings to that of its precursors. Nor is Ryman's endeavor bound to the idea of Minimalism, which his painting of the late 1950's and early 1960's anticipated and his present work survives. The purity Ryman's work embodies is not a moral fiction or a Utopian art-historical construct, but a consequence of practical painterly discipline." (R. Storr, "Robert Ryman: Making Distinctions," Art in America, June 1986, p. 92)

In spite of his restricted formal vocabulary, Ryman has avoided repetition. The "white" of Ryman's painting is in fact a plurality of whites, their tonalities resulting from a range of pigments, mediums, surfaces and techniques.

Marker (1988) was among several paintings included in his retrospective exhibition at the Dia Art Foundation which hang without any visible fasteners. This further emphasizes the important relationship of the painting to the wall plane. The linen edge becomes yet another line. The paint extends to the edges and beyond the hard lines of the sides, conveying a sense of movement from the center outward beyond the boundary of the picture plane, coexisting with the wall plane as one experience.

The many layers of paint are applied with a palette knife, which was a relatively new technique for Ryman at the time. By subtly building up the picture plane and sanding the surfaces in between, he creates an extremely soft surface full of nuance and light.