The Rothko Book

“Sumptuously illustrated with reproductions of 50 paintings, this book celebrates the rich artistic legacy of American artist Mark Rothko” (Publishers Weekly). Mark Rothko’s iconic paintings are some of the most profound works of twentieth-century Abstract Expressionism. This collection presents fifty large-scale artworks from the American master’s color field period (1949–1970) alongside essays by Rothko’s son, Christopher Rothko, and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art curator of painting and sculpture, Janet Bishop. Featuring illuminating details about Rothko’s life, influences, and legacy, and brimming with the emotional power and expressive color of his groundbreaking canvases, this essential volume brings the renowned artist’s luminous work to light for both longtime Rothko fans and those discovering his work for the first time.

"Mark Rothko (1903-1970), world-renowned icon of Abstract Expressionism, is rediscovered in this wholly original examination of his art and life written by his son. Synthesizing rigorous critique with personal anecdotes, Christopher, the younger of the artist's two children, offers a unique perspective on this modern master. Christopher Rothko draws on an intimate knowledge of the artworks to present eighteen essays that look closely at the paintings and explore the ways in which they foster a profound connection between viewer and artist through form, color, and scale. The prominent commissions for the Rothko Chapel in Houston and the Seagram Building murals in New York receive extended treatment, as do many of the lesser-known and underappreciated aspects of Rothko's oeuvre, including reassessments of his late dark canvases and his formidable body of works on paper. The author also discusses the artist's writings of the 1930s and 1940s, the significance of music to the artist, and our enduring struggles with visual abstraction in the contemporary era. Finally, Christopher Rothko writes movingly about his role as the artist's son, his commonalities with his father, and the terms of the relationship they forged during the writer's childhood." -- Publisher's description.

The first publication dedicated exclusively to Mark Rothko’s art during the critical formative period of the 1940s. Examining the development and artistic exploration of one of the greatest artists of the twentieth century, this unprecedented volume presents the works of American artist Mark Rothko from the 1940s, a time when his most essential development as a painter occurred, dramatically and in a very compact space of time. During this period, Rothko moved from expressive figurative and surrealist canvases to more abstract multiform subjects and finally to his signature abstractions—luminous rectangles of color suspended in space. Richly illustrated with works by Rothko and his contemporaries, introduction by Todd Herman and essays by prominent Rothko scholars, this important new book deepens our understanding of Rothko’s art during this vital period, and that of the mature works that emerged from it.

An overview of the life and work of artist Mark Rothko, this volume exhibits his mythological content, simple flat shapes, and imagery inspired by primitive art.

I am interested only in expressing basic human emotions - tragedy, ecstasy, doom, - Mark Rothko (1903 - 1970) said of his paintings. If you are moved only by their colour relationships, then you miss the point. Throughout his career, Rothko was concerned with what other people experienced when they looked at his canvases. As his work shifted from figurative imagery to luminous fields of colour, his concern expanded to the setting in which his paintings were exhibited.

Mark Rothko (1903-1970) was one of the greatest painters of the 20th century and a giant of Abstract Expressionism. Of interest to an art enthusiast, this is both a practical manual for discovering and understanding the artist, and an authoritative guide to his life and work.

At the time of Mark Rothko's apparent suicide in 1970, the deeply troubled, pioneering artist of Abstract Expressionism was at the height of fame and financial success; yet within months of the funeral, his three trusted friends, acting as executors, relinquished his entire legacy of 800 paintings to the powerful, international Marlborough Galleries (run by Frank Lloyd) for a fraction of their real worth on terms suspiciously unfavorable to the estate. The suit that Rothko's daughter brought against the executors and Marlborough rocked the art world with its shocking revelations of corruption in the international art trade: from the deceptions practiced on Rothko when he was alive to the scandals after his death involving conspiracies and cover-ups, double dealings and betrayals, missing paintings and manipulated markets, phony sales and laundered profits, forgery and fraud.

This is the first volume of the catalogue raisonne of the work of Mark Rothko, the abstract artist. It documents Rothko's entire output of paintings on canvas and panel, reproducing all the works in colour. An introductory text investigates the essential features of Rothko's art.