[atlaw]

As much unmitigated hogwash as Rothko's own commentaries.

Rothko was indisputably a self-important and pretentious interpreter of his own work. His rantings properly ignored, his work stands on its own and has a peculiar ability to work on the imagination. A visit to the Rothko Chapel in Houston, with its imposing silence, natural light, and wall covering murals that seem to open into galactic depths, will persuade you that your own commentary is both uninformed and ill-considered.

[Republicanprofessor]

A visit to the Rothko Chapel in Houston, with its imposing silence, natural light, and wall covering murals that seem to open into galactic depths

Thank you for your insight.

I visited there a while ago but only had 10 minutes, 5 of which was spent buying slides. I am dying to go back and really sit and think about those works in location. They do seem much bleaker than his other works, with less to offer. But I like your "galactic depths" comment very much.

[petro45acp]

Frankly I've seen pics of that Houston chapel, and Wright's Racine office complex does more for me. Nope, if one needs to expand one's imagination, read some good speculative fiction, or hey, didn't Hawking just release a new improved and more accessable history of time? Goedel-Escher-Bach is another good read. Staring at the scrapings of a self involved artist isn't gonna do it.

If art doesn't portray something discernable ...

More stuff.

Cheers,

[x]

His rantings properly ignored, his work stands on its own and has a peculiar ability to work on the imagination. A visit to the Rothko Chapel in Houston, with its imposing silence, natural light, and wall covering murals that seem to open into galactic depths, will persuade you that your own commentary is both uninformed and ill-considered.

Maybe Rothko wasn't so much as an easel and canvas painter and more as a creator of environments, or his work at least had tendencies in that direction. Getting the whole experience of a building or room may give much more than what one painting on a museum wall offers. What he and other abstractionists are "trying to say" may be closer to what people get from architecture or music than from literature or traditional canvas painting. If so, is this an indication of a fault in modernism, or in painting as a 20th or 21st century art?