"Art is an adventure
into an unknown world, which can be explored only by those willing to take
risks"
Mark Rothko and Adolph Gotllieb manifesto, published in 1943 in the New York
Times
We present Mark Rothko: Into an Unknown World, the first
exhibition ever staged in Moscow by one of the world’s most celebrated
artists.
Exhibition
Featuring over a dozen paintings, the exhibition spans twenty years of the
artist’s career, from 1949 to 1969, and includes No. 12 (Yellow, Orange, Red on
Orange), 1954 as well as monumental studies for all three of Rothko’s famous
mural projects: The Seagram Murals, The Holyoke Center at Harvard University
and the Rothko Chapel at the University of St. Thomas in Houston. The
exhibition includes one of Rothko’s last grey and black paintings from
1969.
Catalogue
A fully illustrated catalogue accompanies the exhibition with essays by Dr.
Irving Sandler and Prof. Andrei Tolstoy. Dr Irving Sandler is
an international Rothko expert, art critic and historian. Professor Andrei
Tolstoi is an art historian, corresponding member of the Russian Art
Academy
Artist: short biography
Mark Rothko was born Marcus Rothkovitz on September 25 in
Dvinsk, Russia (today Daugavpils, Latvia) to Anna Goldin and Jacob Rothkowitz.
He was the youngest of four children. In 1913 he emigrated with his
mother and sister to the United States. He studied painting at Yale University
from 1921-23, and was later awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from
Yale in 1969. In 1958 Rothko received commission to paint murals for the
Seagram Building, New York. Later he reconsidered the space intended for
the murals in the Seagram Building and withdrew from the project. In 1961 the
artist received commission from Harvard University to paint murals for the
school's Holyoke Center, he donated the three sets of completed murals
which were withdrawn from the Seagram Building earlier. In 1964 Rothko
received commission from John and Dominique de Menil to paint murals for
Houston chapel. In 1970 Mark Rothko took his own life. In 1978 The Pace
Gallery, New York, began representing the estate of Mark Rothko.
Rothko has been the subject of six major surveys and retrospectives, including
the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (1998), which travelled to the
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York and the Musée d'Art Moderne de la
Ville de Paris; the Kawamura Memorial Art Museum, Japan, which travelled to
three museums in Japan (1995-96); the Tate Gallery, London, which travelled to
Museum Ludwig, Cologne (1987-88); the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
(1978-79); and two exhibitions at The Museum of Modern Art, New York, in 1970
and 1961 - the retrospective in 1961 traveled to London, Amsterdam, Basel,
Rome, and Paris. Rothko's work is in numerous permanent collections
worldwide.
