After Rothko (English)

me
Jul 1, 2015
2 min read

repost from original @estellalicious

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Rothko, Painting (photo source: wikimedia commons)

I had never gone back to the Seoul Arts Center after being shocked at how disappointing their curating of the Chagall’s exhibit was. They had painted the walls behind the elusive, vulnerable, dreamy works with clashing colors ranging from grass green to blood scarlet: utter disturbance. However, after the continuous buzz for the new summer Rothko exhibit, blaming my ambiguous mix of 50/50 obligation and curiosity, I crawled my way over to see for myself.

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The Rothko I had

I never really thought about the logistics or theory behind Rothko— which I guess turned out to have adhered with Rothko’s original wishes: as of how the audience should view and interact with his work. To be honest I had my Rothko, a copy from the Whitney, hanging in my room for years merely for the pleasant aesthetics of the piece. It harmonized shades of bright canary yellows with a pinkish magenta. So when this exhibit really illuminated my view on Rothko and his paintings, I was more than (pleasantly) surprised. It brought together all the vagrant feelings I had felt with each and every Rothko piece I had seen scattered around the world in various museums and galleries. The “cheerleading effect” happened, if you have room for amusing comparisons. By trapping the viewer in a somewhat overwhelming cage full of colourful mirages, the exhibit in some ways seemed to achieve the goal that Rothko aimed for his whole life: the interaction of pure emotion. The staggering density of all his works stirred up emotions from corners of my physique— places that I never even knew could twitch. The exhibition was a walk-through of Rothko’s life, chronologically arraying his lifetime works in a maze structure. It not only showed the transformations in his style and artistic expression, but also in his emotion and philosophy. The eyes of the crowd avoided their phone screens for a moment, and were fixated directly on one façade or another instead. I witnessed mesmerization, and many were unable to easily move onto the next step within the labyrinth. Including me: I stood speechless in front of not only my favorite piece, or everyone's favourite piece the electric Harvard Mural Sketch, but also throughout the process of Rothko’s darkening hues as I walked towards the end of his life. Many might share the suspicious thought, wandering "how in the world can blocks of color mean so much"? But my realization came from exactly that thought— that his effect may come from exactly that simplicity, yet with the slight twist of powerful irony. I had a thought that maybe the overwhelming tidals came from the fact that Rothko extrapolated every-day colors and blended them carefully into excessive masses, forcing us to realize and acknowledge the ordinary from the looming clouds of pigment (none of the beautiful colors were “new” to our eyes). It may have been the serene, almost eerie, classical music seeping through the walls that made the exhibit especially melancholic. Yet the feelings that I know will crumble away in the morning still resonate with me in this night.