- 169
Robert Ryman
Description
- Robert Ryman
- Untitled (Red)
- signed on the overlap
- acrylic and charcoal on canvas
- 8 by 8 in. 20.3 by 20.3 cm.
- Executed circa 1964, this work will be listed as catalogue number 64.049 in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné being organized by David Gray.
Provenance
Phillips, New York, November 13, 2000, lot 37
Acquired by the present owner from the above sale
Literature
Condition
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.
Catalogue Note
Sixty years ago, Robert Ryman made art history through a series of radical and zealous decisions that enabled him to become the pre-eminent minimalist painter. Ryman’s paintings give us the stark truth, making it emphatically clear that what stands before us is paint on canvas. Working almost exclusively with white paint, Ryman empties his paintings of all illusionism. Applying the paint in this work in a thick impasto, the material of paint is the subject matter. The viewer is encouraged to delect upon the luscious dollops of paint. In this particular example, as Ryman did in several of his most important paintings, a different color predominate under the white. Active thick white brushstrokes populate two separate areas of paint leaving the rest of the canvas raw. The support and medium are allowed to be independent whilst an outline in graphite captures the square concentrations of paint. Ryman makes unapologetically honest paintings that are beautiful mediations on the nature of paint. Paint became the content of the paintings, as well as their form. They have no meaning outside the paint and the exposed supporting canvas and the history of the process of application. This fundamental shift in Ryman’s work and, consequentially, art history occurred right at the time Untitled (Red) was created in 1964. One can see many of the developments in the painting. The graphite square makes explicit the planning process behind the composition that is based upon the physical square parameters of the canvas. The flashes of red allude to the drama of the dominant art historical movement at the time: Abstr൩act Expressionism, as does the thick application of paint and yet Ryman’s work is emptied of all the action of de Kooning or Pollock. The white paint suppresses th🎶e drama of the red and creates a work of calm elegance. The aim was to paint the paint. In his search to get closer to what was for him the heart of painting, the fundamental meaning and challenge of it, Ryman liberates paint to be itself.