[/caption]Once again the magazine Tate etc. hits paydirt with in the section called Microtate, in which Esther Stocker comments on Robert Ryman's painting Ledger 1982. The painting may be hard to see depending on your monitor, it consists of the subtlest changes of color on aluminum.
"I think it is the deeper secret of a good painting that it doesn't give you something, it takes something away from you. It leaves you with less than you had before, sometimes even with nothing. At least that is what happens with me. My old room-mate told me once that I am the dumbest person on earth for not knowing which things belong to me. This hurt. I hated hearing my human importance being measure by remembering (or not remembering) which teacup was mine.
"Paintings such as Robert Ryman's Ledger don't tell you what to see or what to think. Whatever instruction you might be given for its better understanding, it only shows you it is useless. I like to hang out in a painting such as this, not remembering this and that, things I always thought I should know. My head slowly empties and I cannot find much in there anymore. I am always happy not to find things. It gives me a calm sense of freedom. It is so great not to get it, to know a little bit less. I think this is called liberation."
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