National Gallery of Art
For most of his career, Mark Rothko preferred to use large formats for his paintings. For him “large pictures are like dramas in which one participates in a direct way” but painting a small picture “is to place yourself outside your experience, to look upon an experience as a stereopticon view or with a reducing glass. However you paint the larger picture, you are in it.”
This painting is one of the largest in the Gallery’s collection at 105 inches tall by 93 inches wide and currently on view in the West Building, Ground Floor, with one other large oil on canvas from 1961, No. 1.
Have you seen this painting in person before? What was your impression of its size? How does it appear on your screen now?#Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1955, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1992.51.14 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
The National Gallery of Art is home to the most extensive public collection in the world of works by Mark Rothko. In 1986 the Mark Rothko Foundation determined that its mission to conserve its collection of Rothko’s art and to enhance and promote Rothko’s legacy through scholarly research and exhibitions would best be served by strategically placing his canvases and works on paper in 35 major international museums. The Gallery received more than 1,100 artworks, as well as research materials, conservation records, and exhibition reviews. Works not on display, including this small but electrically vibrant ink and wash drawing, may be viewed and studied by appointment in the Gallery’s two Print and Drawing Study Rooms.
Make an appointment for your visit to the Print and Drawing Study Rooms here: http://bit.ly/NGAStudyRooms. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1961, pen and ink and wash on wove paper, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.56.639 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
From about 1947 to 1949, Mark Rothko’s works on paper and canvas were marked by translucent forms of color hovering within a chromatic field, as seen in this exemplary work. Works in this mode came to be known as “multiforms,” although Rothko never referred to them by that name. These images represent a crucial turning point in the artist's career.
What do you see when you look at this work of art? What associations does it bring to mind? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1949, watercolor and tempera on paper, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.43.256 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko explored, tested, and developed subjects on paper and canvas simultaneously. In the early 1940s, he sought a universal language and shared knowledge base, gravitating towards motifs drawn from classical texts, mythology, and religion. The watercolor (shown here) treats the legend of Oedipus, the tragic mythical Greek king prophesized to kill his father and marry his mother. Click the link to see how it relates closely to a pair of paintings on canvas from the same period, one of which is in the Gallery’s collection. In the watercolor, Rothko entwines and blends the anatomies of an embracing couple. The ruin wrought by Oedipus’ prophesy-fulfillment is alluded to by an eviscerated ribcage, spilling intestines, and skeletal limbs. Rothko’s double-faced heads recall antique sculptures of Janus, the Roman deity of transitions and change, who looks simultaneously to the past and the future. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1939/1942, drawing, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.56.522 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Link: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1939/1942, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.43.36 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko appears to have engaged artistically with contemporary political events during World War II by drawing on Greek mythology and tragedy. In this watercolor, from around 1944, biomorphic forms suggest eyeballs, wings, ears, and other animal attributes, including, in the center of the composition’s upper register, a form that can be read as an eagle’s head, rabbit’s head, or both.
During this surrealist phase of his career Rothko favored bird and rabbit motifs, which he adopted from the Greek playwright Aeschylus. In the tragedy Oresteia (485 BC) an omen—two eagles devouring a pregnant hare—foretells the destruction of Troy by the Greeks. Rothko’s interest in stories of ancient warfare have been understood to relate to World War II, a concrete reference to which might be found in the multiple flying shapes in this work that resemble a German military decoration, the Iron Cross. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1944/1945, watercolor, tempera, graphite, and ink on paper, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.43.221 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko often drew and painted on construction paper, a multi purpose craft material more commonly associated with children’s art projects. In this watercolor from the mid-1940s, Rothko chose a black sheet, areas of which he deliberately left unpainted. The choice of black paper provided a readymade background of seemingly infinite depth (whether submarine or celestial is unclear) for Rothko’s surreal, biomorphic, and vegetal forms.
To what extent do you think Rothko’s works are influenced by his years teaching children at the Center Academy of the Brooklyn Jewish Center? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Mark Rothko, "Abstract Composition," c. 1943, drawing, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko was born Marcus Rothkowitz in Dvinsk, Russia (today Daugavpils, Latvia), in 1903. In early works he signed his name “M. Rothkowitz” (twice in this one, for some reason). Rothko became a U.S. citizen in 1938, and probably in 1940 he began using an anglicized version of his surname: “Rothko.” This vividly colored watercolor of a female nude testifies to the artist’s early interest in the figurative paintings of Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, especially their use of expressive color.
Do you see any similarities to Matisse or Picasso in this work of art? What are they? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Seated Nude with Hands Resting on Knees,” drawing, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.56.472 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Rothko's work is characterized by rigorous attention to formal elements such as color, shape, balance, depth, composition, and scale; yet, he refused to consider his paintings solely in these terms. He explained: “It is a widely accepted notion among painters that it does not matter what one paints as long as it is well painted. This is the essence of academicism. There is no such thing as good painting about nothing.”
Do you like Rothko's paintings? Why or why not? #ArtAtoZ #Rothko
Image: Mark Rothko, “No. 1,” 1961, oil and acrylic on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.43.151 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
During the 1920s and 1930s Rothko produced nearly 1,500 works in watercolor, graphite, crayon, and ink on loose sheets of paper and in sketchbooks. These include landscapes of various locations, most prominently Portland, Oregon, where Rothko emigrated from Dvinsk, Russia (now Daugavpils, Latvia), in 1913, and where he lived until he left to attend Yale University in 1921. Early landscapes such as this one show Rothko’s stylistic debt to the French post-impressionist Paul Cezanne and the American modernist John Marin. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Untitled,” late 1920s, watercolor and ink on paper, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.43.204 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko made drawings throughout his career, from the late 1920s to his death in 1970. These drawings served as preparatory sketches for paintings, as technical exercises, and as autonomous, exhibited works. Until the early 1940s, Rothko made hundreds of figure studies like this one, which depicts a friend relaxing in a rocking chair and cradling a small dog, quite possibly Rothko’s pet, Schnookers.
Rothko used an ink pen on a sheet of inexpensive correspondence paper torn from a tablet. Drawn in a casual manner with a meandering line, the sketch conveys with charm and sensitivity the intimate mood of this relaxed domestic scene. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Woman seated on Rocking Chair with Puppy in Lap”, 1938-1942, pen and black ink on wove paper, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
In 1929 Rothko began teaching children at the Center Academy of the Brooklyn Jewish Center, a position he retained for more than 20 years. In the 1930s Rothko painted mostly street scenes and interiors with figures. Rejecting conventional modes of representation, he stressed an emotional approach to the subject--an approach he admired in children's art--and adopted a style characterized by deliberate deformations and a crude application of paint. #Rothko#ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Street Scene,” 1936/1937, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.43.21 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko produced a number of haunting images of the New York subway, in which windows, portals, and walls serve as structural and expressive devices of confinement. Rothko shows the subway as a measured yet eccentric place, containing a dramatic contrast of perspectival extremes: walls and railings are represented as flat screens, while tracks recede sharply. Figures can be identified by anecdotal details of dress as commuters, shoppers, or schoolchildren, but they are largely attenuated, faceless, and flat.
Is this what you imagine when you think of a subway? #Rothko#ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Underground Fantasy [Subway],” c. 1940, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.43.130 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
At the end of 1934 Rothko participated in an exhibition at the Gallery Secession, whose members included Louis Harris, Adolph Gottlieb, Ilya Bolotowsky, and Joseph Solman; several months later these artists formed their own group, the Ten, which exhibited together 8 times between 1935 and 1939. Rothko's paintings in the Ten's exhibitions were expressionist in style. During this period he worked in the easel division of the WPA (Works Progress Administration), a federally-sponsored arts project.
What jumps out at you when you look carefully at this work of art? Is it what you think of when we say "Rothko"? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Untitled (String Quartet),”1935, oil on hardboard, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.43.30 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko was born Marcus Rothkowitz in Dvinsk, Russia (today Daugavpils, Latvia), in 1903. In early works he signed his name “M. Rothkowitz” (twice in this one, for some reason). Rothko became a U.S. citizen in 1938, and probably in 1940 he began using an anglicized version of his surname: “Rothko.” This vividly colored watercolor of a female nude testifies to the artist’s early interest in the figurative paintings of Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, especially their use of expressive color.
Do you see any similarities to Matisse or Picasso in this work of art? What are they? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Mark Rothko, Seated Nude with Hands Resting on Knees (detail), drawing, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.56.472 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
For most of his career, Mark Rothko preferred to use large formats for his paintings. For him “large pictures are like dramas in which one participates in a direct way” but painting a small picture “is to place yourself outside your experience, to look upon an experience as a stereopticon view or with a reducing glass. However you paint the larger picture, you are in it.”
This painting is one of the largest in the Gallery’s collection at 105 inches tall by 93 inches wide and currently on view in the West Building, Ground Floor, with one other large oil on canvas from 1961, No. 1.
Have you seen this painting in person before? What was your impression of its size? How does it appear on your screen now?#Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1955, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1992.51.14 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
The National Gallery of Art is home to the most extensive public collection in the world of works by Mark Rothko. In 1986 the Mark Rothko Foundation determined that its mission to conserve its collection of Rothko’s art and to enhance and promote Rothko’s legacy through scholarly research and exhibitions would best be served by strategically placing his canvases and works on paper in 35 major international museums. The Gallery received more than 1,100 artworks, as well as research materials, conservation records, and exhibition reviews. Works not on display, including this small but electrically vibrant ink and wash drawing, may be viewed and studied by appointment in the Gallery’s two Print and Drawing Study Rooms.
Make an appointment for your visit to the Print and Drawing Study Rooms here: http://bit.ly/NGAStudyRooms. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1961, pen and ink and wash on wove paper, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.56.639 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
From about 1947 to 1949, Mark Rothko’s works on paper and canvas were marked by translucent forms of color hovering within a chromatic field, as seen in this exemplary work. Works in this mode came to be known as “multiforms,” although Rothko never referred to them by that name. These images represent a crucial turning point in the artist's career.
What do you see when you look at this work of art? What associations does it bring to mind? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1949, watercolor and tempera on paper, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.43.256 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko explored, tested, and developed subjects on paper and canvas simultaneously. In the early 1940s, he sought a universal language and shared knowledge base, gravitating towards motifs drawn from classical texts, mythology, and religion. The watercolor (shown here) treats the legend of Oedipus, the tragic mythical Greek king prophesized to kill his father and marry his mother. Click the link to see how it relates closely to a pair of paintings on canvas from the same period, one of which is in the Gallery’s collection. In the watercolor, Rothko entwines and blends the anatomies of an embracing couple. The ruin wrought by Oedipus’ prophesy-fulfillment is alluded to by an eviscerated ribcage, spilling intestines, and skeletal limbs. Rothko’s double-faced heads recall antique sculptures of Janus, the Roman deity of transitions and change, who looks simultaneously to the past and the future. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1939/1942, drawing, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.56.522 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Link: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1939/1942, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.43.36 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko appears to have engaged artistically with contemporary political events during World War II by drawing on Greek mythology and tragedy. In this watercolor, from around 1944, biomorphic forms suggest eyeballs, wings, ears, and other animal attributes, including, in the center of the composition’s upper register, a form that can be read as an eagle’s head, rabbit’s head, or both.
During this surrealist phase of his career Rothko favored bird and rabbit motifs, which he adopted from the Greek playwright Aeschylus. In the tragedy Oresteia (485 BC) an omen—two eagles devouring a pregnant hare—foretells the destruction of Troy by the Greeks. Rothko’s interest in stories of ancient warfare have been understood to relate to World War II, a concrete reference to which might be found in the multiple flying shapes in this work that resemble a German military decoration, the Iron Cross. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, "Untitled," 1944/1945, watercolor, tempera, graphite, and ink on paper, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.43.221 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko often drew and painted on construction paper, a multi purpose craft material more commonly associated with children’s art projects. In this watercolor from the mid-1940s, Rothko chose a black sheet, areas of which he deliberately left unpainted. The choice of black paper provided a readymade background of seemingly infinite depth (whether submarine or celestial is unclear) for Rothko’s surreal, biomorphic, and vegetal forms.
To what extent do you think Rothko’s works are influenced by his years teaching children at the Center Academy of the Brooklyn Jewish Center? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Mark Rothko, "Abstract Composition," c. 1943, drawing, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko was born Marcus Rothkowitz in Dvinsk, Russia (today Daugavpils, Latvia), in 1903. In early works he signed his name “M. Rothkowitz” (twice in this one, for some reason). Rothko became a U.S. citizen in 1938, and probably in 1940 he began using an anglicized version of his surname: “Rothko.” This vividly colored watercolor of a female nude testifies to the artist’s early interest in the figurative paintings of Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, especially their use of expressive color.
Do you see any similarities to Matisse or Picasso in this work of art? What are they? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Seated Nude with Hands Resting on Knees,” drawing, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.56.472 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Rothko's work is characterized by rigorous attention to formal elements such as color, shape, balance, depth, composition, and scale; yet, he refused to consider his paintings solely in these terms. He explained: “It is a widely accepted notion among painters that it does not matter what one paints as long as it is well painted. This is the essence of academicism. There is no such thing as good painting about nothing.”
Do you like Rothko's paintings? Why or why not? #ArtAtoZ #Rothko
Image: Mark Rothko, “No. 1,” 1961, oil and acrylic on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.43.151 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
During the 1920s and 1930s Rothko produced nearly 1,500 works in watercolor, graphite, crayon, and ink on loose sheets of paper and in sketchbooks. These include landscapes of various locations, most prominently Portland, Oregon, where Rothko emigrated from Dvinsk, Russia (now Daugavpils, Latvia), in 1913, and where he lived until he left to attend Yale University in 1921. Early landscapes such as this one show Rothko’s stylistic debt to the French post-impressionist Paul Cezanne and the American modernist John Marin. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Untitled,” late 1920s, watercolor and ink on paper, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.43.204 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko made drawings throughout his career, from the late 1920s to his death in 1970. These drawings served as preparatory sketches for paintings, as technical exercises, and as autonomous, exhibited works. Until the early 1940s, Rothko made hundreds of figure studies like this one, which depicts a friend relaxing in a rocking chair and cradling a small dog, quite possibly Rothko’s pet, Schnookers.
Rothko used an ink pen on a sheet of inexpensive correspondence paper torn from a tablet. Drawn in a casual manner with a meandering line, the sketch conveys with charm and sensitivity the intimate mood of this relaxed domestic scene. #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Woman seated on Rocking Chair with Puppy in Lap”, 1938-1942, pen and black ink on wove paper, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
In 1929 Rothko began teaching children at the Center Academy of the Brooklyn Jewish Center, a position he retained for more than 20 years. In the 1930s Rothko painted mostly street scenes and interiors with figures. Rejecting conventional modes of representation, he stressed an emotional approach to the subject--an approach he admired in children's art--and adopted a style characterized by deliberate deformations and a crude application of paint. #Rothko#ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Street Scene,” 1936/1937, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.43.21 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko produced a number of haunting images of the New York subway, in which windows, portals, and walls serve as structural and expressive devices of confinement. Rothko shows the subway as a measured yet eccentric place, containing a dramatic contrast of perspectival extremes: walls and railings are represented as flat screens, while tracks recede sharply. Figures can be identified by anecdotal details of dress as commuters, shoppers, or schoolchildren, but they are largely attenuated, faceless, and flat.
Is this what you imagine when you think of a subway? #Rothko#ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Underground Fantasy [Subway],” c. 1940, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.43.130 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
At the end of 1934 Rothko participated in an exhibition at the Gallery Secession, whose members included Louis Harris, Adolph Gottlieb, Ilya Bolotowsky, and Joseph Solman; several months later these artists formed their own group, the Ten, which exhibited together 8 times between 1935 and 1939. Rothko's paintings in the Ten's exhibitions were expressionist in style. During this period he worked in the easel division of the WPA (Works Progress Administration), a federally-sponsored arts project.
What jumps out at you when you look carefully at this work of art? Is it what you think of when we say "Rothko"? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Image: Mark Rothko, “Untitled (String Quartet),”1935, oil on hardboard, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.43.30 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Mark Rothko was born Marcus Rothkowitz in Dvinsk, Russia (today Daugavpils, Latvia), in 1903. In early works he signed his name “M. Rothkowitz” (twice in this one, for some reason). Rothko became a U.S. citizen in 1938, and probably in 1940 he began using an anglicized version of his surname: “Rothko.” This vividly colored watercolor of a female nude testifies to the artist’s early interest in the figurative paintings of Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, especially their use of expressive color.
Do you see any similarities to Matisse or Picasso in this work of art? What are they? #Rothko #ArtAtoZ
Mark Rothko, Seated Nude with Hands Resting on Knees (detail), drawing, National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. 1986.56.472 © 2015 by Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
At the end of 1934 Rothko participated in an exhibition at the Gallery Secession, whose members included Louis Harris, Adolph Gottlieb, Ilya Bolotowsky, and Joseph Solman; several months later these artists formed their own group, the Ten, which exhibited together 8 times between 1935 and 1939. Rothko's paintings in the Ten's exhibitions were expressionist in style. During this period he worked in the easel division of the WPA (Works Progress Administration), a federally-spon⋯⋯
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