Mark Rothko: More Than Just Colors

 

Mark Rothko is a renowned abstract expressionist painter, but, before about a month ago, I had no idea who he was. About a month ago is when my brother visited me in Chicago. During his trip he went to the art institute of Chicago. He sent me a photo of a Mark Rothko painting (pictured below) saying “I can’t believe I got to see this in person. Life changing.” I opened up the photo and all I saw was blocks of colors. I respond with “I’m gonna be honest, I don’t get it. Happy for you tho.” When he got back from the Art Institute he explained to me how he’s a huge Rothko fan and every time he sees a Rothko painting in person he gets so emotional (he is not usually a very emotional person). He further explained that you can’t get the full effect of a Rothko from seeing a photo of it. With a photo of a Rothko, you can only see colored blocks (like I saw); it’s only when you see it in person can you get the full experience. I suppose this can be said about most art, but it is especially the case with Rothko.

Untitled (Purple, White, and Red) 1953

A couple of weeks ago I went to the Art Institute and saw the same painting. After standing there for a few moments, I sent my brother a text: “I get it now.” The waves of feelings I experienced looking at a piece that I originally called “just blocks of colors” were so vast and intense. I don’t even know how to begin to articulate the range of emotions. It was exactly as my brother said it would be. Even though I was just looking at a painting it was an intense and healing experience.

Rothko says: “I’m not interested in the relationship of color to form or anything else… I’m interested only in expressing basic human emotions - tragedy, ecstasy, and so on. And the fact that a lot of people break down and cry when confronted with my pictures shows that I can communicate those basic human emotions… The people who weep before my pictures are having the same religious experience I had when I painted them. And if you are moved only by their color relationship, then you missed the point.”

Rothko’s intentions are very clear and effective in his pieces, both healing to himself and the viewer, just as Rick Rubin says art should in his book The Creative Act: A Way of Being. Rubin also heavily writes about how one’s experience in the world informs one’s art. Although Rothko is creating these pieces, Rothko is not creating the “emotions of tragedy, ecstasy, and so on.” Rothko is a part of the universe and channels all of these existing feelings, letting them flow through him in his creative act. He is hyperconscious of these feelings and channels them. Everything is a part of the creative act from everything Rothko experiences to what he chooses to paint, then Rothko takes this even further by having his creative act contain what the viewer experiences, having the viewer feel precisely what he did when he painted it.