‘How Robert Ryman became the master of white’ by Laura Cumming
2026
There are two myths about Ryman (1930-2019): that he was entirely self-taught and painted only in white. Born in Nashville, he arrived in New York as a jazz musician, working days at the Museum of Modern Art as a guard. In fact Ryman studied in the museum’s experimental art programme on and off for seven years, and his range of colours is surprisingly vast. At the Barbican, rhythmic white strokes take off in all directions from a cobalt blue base, green shimmies in behind white impasto and black rectangles try, and fail, to edge in on the white performance.
Read more at The Observer.
