Robert
Ryman

The author of a singular oeuvre that is sometimes associated with Minimal Art, Robert Ryman is a leading figure of American painting in the second half of the 20th century and the early 21st century.

Born in 1930 in Nashville, Tennessee, Robert Ryman moves to New York in the 1950s. A saxophonist, he “learns” painting after meeting Sol LeWitt and Dan Flavin at MoMA where the three men have jobs as guards. Ryman quickly develops a holistic approach to painting: starting from a square shape and the color white, he researches all that is linked with the painting. Around 1965, he starts using a more systematic method based on the repetition of lines and motifs. The use of the color white gives renewed importance to the frame, the chassis and the metal rods that are all part of the artwork.

The Robert Ryman artworks held in the Pinault Collection were first presented in 2006 at the Where Are We Going? exhibition at Palazzo Grassi, in Venice.