To hear it from curators, gray is not just a familiar color for Jasper Johns but the essence of a long metaphysical journey, an exploration of the condition of gray itself. At least that’s the premise of a sprawling exhibition of his work that opens Tuesday at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

"Tennyson",1958 (Photo: Courtesy of Jasper Johns)

But when pressed on the show’s focus, he said simply: “Yes, gray has been important to me. But I don’t tend to think of it as separate from the rest of my work.”

"Flag," 1958 (Photo: Courtesy of Jasper Johns)

The response is classic Johns. In a parallel to his mysterious grays, suggesting both effacement and a resolute ambiguity, Mr. Johns seems to have perfected the art of talking about his work without ever revealing too much. Always courtly, he answers questions in a measured, seemingly straightforward manner that leaves a listener wanting to know far more. It’s as if he is aware that a myth surrounds him that he must be careful not to dispel.

"Target," 1958 (Photo: Courtesy of Jasper Johns)

For decades now his interpretation of flags and targets, numbers and letters — things, as he has often said, “the mind already knows,” “things that were seen and not looked at, not examined” — have become as embedded in the contemporary American art psyche as Andy Warhol’s soup cans or Jackson Pollock’s drips

"Two Flags," 1959 (Photo: Courtesy of Jasper Johns)

Throughout this career he has relentlessly pushed his work to new places, from the flags of the 1950s to the maps of the ’60s to the “Seasons” cycle of the ’80s, in which he seems to appear as a vulnerable phantom figure. His explorations, in which the literal and conceptual can overlap in provocative ways, have served as inspirations to younger artists.

"Gray Alphabets" 1960, (Photo: Courtesy of Jasper Johns)

Yet until this exhibition was organized, his use of gray — as a pigment, a stenciled word, a section of crosshatching — had not been singled out for sustained attention. The show, which began at the Art Institute of Chicago, insists that attention must finally be paid to what Mr. Johns once said was his “favorite color.”

"0 through 9", 1961 (Photo: Courtesy of Jasper Johns)

“At first I had some idea that the absence of color made the work more physical,” he explained. “Early on I was very involved with the notion of the painting as an object and tended to attack that idea from different directions.”

"No", 1961 (Photo: Courtesy of Jasper Johns)

Although monochrome paintings have existed throughout history, Mr. Johns said he wasn’t trying to be part of any tradition. “I was trying to do something else.”

"Liar", 1961 (Photo: Courtesy of Jasper Johns)

Throughout this career he has relentlessly pushed his work to new places, from the flags of the 1950s to the maps of the ’60s to the “Seasons” cycle of the ’80s, in which he seems to appear as a vulnerable phantom figure. His explorations, in which the literal and conceptual can overlap in provocative ways, have served as inspirations to younger artists.

"Map", 1962 (Photo: Courtesy of Jasper Johns)

“Without question he’s one of the most important painters of his generation,” said Robert Storr, who is the dean of Yale University’s School of Art and has known Mr. Johns since the late 1960s. “He put bits and pieces of painting and conceptual practice together in a way that nobody has done.”

Jasper Johns in 1966 with one of his flag paintings, and other works by him. (Photo: The New York Times)

(source: "Jasper Johns: Gray" by courtesy of www.nytimes.com)