Richard Tuttle’s artworks are a little like what some contemporary chefs call “deconstructed dishes.” In a deconstructed dish, the chef separates the ingredients out on the plate, so that the diner must combine them in his or her mouth. (The word “deconstructed” is used here literally and need not have anything to do with philosophy or literary theory.) If you’re the sort of person who is offended by having to do the work of assembling the elements of your meal, then there is a good chance you won’t like Mr.Tuttle.

If, on the other hand, you find the notion of a deconstructed dish an enlightening distraction from the usual mill-run fare, then certainly check out “The Kreutzer Sonata: Historical Work by Richard Tuttle,” a show presented jointly at two galleries – Zwirner & Wirth Uptown and Nyehaus on Gramercy Park. Actually, now is the time to look at Mr. Tuttle, whatever your gustatory predilections.

Mr. Tuttle is having one of those midcareer moments that tend to swamp the city like a tidal wave. The two-venue gallery show is meant as a complement to a major retrospective currently on view at the Whitney. And Mr.Tuttle, who was born in 1941, undoubtedly is a strong influence on many of the better young artists working today, especially those who are attracted to craft, the handmade aesthetic, and “low” materials.

Focusing primarily on works on paper, “The Kreutzer Sonata” (which takes its title from a short story by Leo Tolstoy) is a comely show that brings together some 35 pieces, a host of evanescent drawings and a few humble-looking though beguiling sculptures. A stylistic primitive – his drawings have been compared, at times unfavorably, to the sort of children’s efforts that get hung on the fridge – Mr. Tuttle employs the barest and most subtle of gestures. One sheet at Zwirner & Wirth has only the faintest scribble of green pencil at the bottom of the paper.

Richard Tuttle is, in short, the quietest of contemporary artists; his rhetoric never rises above the lower volume levels. So it is surprising to recall that he was once a figure of great controversy. His 1975 Whitney exhibition caused such an uproar that the curator, Marcia Tucker, was fired. (She went on to found the New Museum of Contemporary Art.)

Here is Ms. Tucker presenting an award to Mr. Tuttle in 1998: “Richard Tuttle ruined my life. I should never have gotten involved. First of all, he thought he could get away with making work that everyone knew wasn’t even art. It was too small, for one thing. Not organized enough, what with stuff thrown on the floor and hung from little nails. And he didn’t even use the right materials. Wire. String. Tin. Pieces of plywood. Pencil lines on the wall, for God’s sake. He never even bothered to get rid of the messy part when he tore his drawings out of the sketchpad.”

It is important to bear in mind that Mr. Tuttle’s work “wasn’t even art” in 1975 because it didn’t look like other art that viewers had encountered.Thirty years later, it’s hard to imagine what all the fuss was about.

Mr. Tuttle continues to work against the grain in at least one sense: He doesn’t make masterworks or summations. Consider one wall work at Nyehaus, a piece of plywood in the shape of a panhandle set vertically from the floor so that the thin part of the “handle” is uppermost. The tiny top edge is painted white. Similarly, in a 1975 drawing at Zwirner, an acute triangle, drawn in graphite on a ripped-out sheet of stenographer’s paper, has a small bar of white watercolor at the hypotenuse.

How, we might ask, do such minorseeming details contribute to the effect of the work? It’s a question that leads us to think about the fact that all art, even the indisputably greatest art, results from such meager details. A Jackson Pollock is torrent of little drips and dashes; a Leonardo is a whole topography of accumulated daubs and dots. Like the chef, Mr. Tuttle leaves each ingredient alone, or nearly alone, on the plate; he doesn’t suffuse his elements in a rich sauce but instead asks us to think about how those elements ordinarily come together. To appreciate it, Mr. Tuttle’s work needs to be experienced as an accretion of such details. A single work will not suffice.

Most of the pieces on view in the galleries are abstract, though even then they nudge us into questions.Are the aqua and green watercolor marks in “Great Men 2” (1982) meant as a purely abstract work? Or are they simply the teased-apart ingredients of a larger, figurative picture? The fact that the drawing hangs in a folky, handmade wooden frame might suggest the latter. But when they are representational, the drawings look nearly abstract, like discrete elements thrown almost haphazardly back to gether again.

Most satisfying, to my eye, are the few sculptures on view. Texture plays an important role in many of Mr. Tuttle’s pieces, even the drawings – to which he will often affix bits of paper, collage-style. But because they are usually somewhat larger than the drawings, the sculptures – four palette shapes cut from paper and divided from each other by what look like little spiral galaxies, for instance, or a miniature wooden fence coupled with crinkly painted fabric and wire, hung on a wall – allow the element of texture greater amplitude.

That said, Mr.Tuttle’s work is virtually always small in scale, no matter how large the individual piece. Of course, there is a much to be said for quiet, but I wouldn’t want to live in such a hushed place any more than I’d want all my lasagnas deconstructed.

Until February 18 (Zwirner & Wirth, 32 E. 69th Street, 212-517-8677; Nyehaus, 15 Gramercy Park South, no. 8D, 212-995-1785).