Then Rothko would sit and look for long periods.
Sometimes for hours, sometimes for days, considering the next colour, considering expanding an area. He worked on more than one painting at a time. The veils of colour were actually applied quickly and spontaneously.
Most of the time in his studio was spent sitting silently on his bench and looking.
Dan Rice, Rothko's assistant (quoted in James Breslin's biography of Mark Rothko)
I don't know if he knew what he was doing. I don't think artists always need to know what they are doing. Artists often do more than they know they are doing.
David Antin art critic (also quoted in Mark Rothko: a biography)
This post is a copy of the one I wrote when I studied Rothko for my UK degree. Click here to see another 2007 post about Rothko that contains a self portrait of moi.
Click here for my post about Rohko on the modernist aesthetic blog.
3 comments:
I have long been one for staring out into space ... it appears I have been keeping very good company all these years ;)
your spare lines drawn from the photo of Rothko has a very apt feeling of there/not there
I don't know much about Rothko...but I think Agnes Martin often worked the same way. Sometimes art needs to 'percolate' before it's put out there in paint or fabric or stitch or words or notes or movements.
To not always know what one is doing...seeing that as okay and art. Mmmm? Does that viewpoint include medical/insurance companies? when one needs to do something, but sits and stares instead. Art or procrastination and confusion? Perhaps I shall reframe?
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