6 ms·

Watching Them Turn Off the Rothkos

59 points by nsns 12y ago

alexandersingh 12y ago
If you're around a Rothko, walk up to it until it fills your field of vision and stare at it without blinking. Within several seconds you'll notice it start to move as though it's alive. I think that you can gain more out of art and, perhaps, a particular artist if you understand their work in context. In this case, understanding what led to Abstract Expressionism and how it influenced artistic development.
- qnaal 12y ago
  >understanding what led to Abstract Expressionism and how it influenced artistic development You mean the CIA plot during the cold war, with the idea that it would make Russian art/culture seem dated when they didn't take it up? Or so I've heard...
  - krapp 12y ago
    While the CIA did secretly fund the abstract expressionist movement and use it as propaganda[0], they didn't invent it out of whole cloth. [0]http://www.openculture.com/2013/04/how_the_cia_turned_american_abstract_expressionism_into_cold_war_propaganda.html http://www.openculture.com/2013/04/how_the_cia_turned_americ...
- stan_rogers 12y ago
  One gets the same effect staring at a wall that doesn't have a Rothko hanging on it. Or at a sufficiently large monitor with a static display. Leveraging persistence of vision might make an interesting series, but when it's the only trick the pony can do?
  - alexandersingh 12y ago
    Oh I wasn't suggesting that it was unique to Rothko's paintings, though I think it works particularly well with the dense color fields.
nsns 12y ago
There are some details here about the way they've been using computer generated illumination: http://theconversation.com/how-we-restored-harvards-rothko-murals-without-touching-them-35245 http://theconversation.com/how-we-restored-harvards-rothko-m...
douche 12y ago
I know, I'm a philistine, but I have never understood the allure of Rothko paintings. Yay, colors in big blocks... I appreciate the efforts of painters who aspired to photo-realism in the age before cameras far more.
- sanswork 12y ago
  I feel the same way about a lot of art but then I think about some clever snippet of code I've seen and how to 99% of the population it probably looks like gibberish and realize that sometimes you require experience and knowledge of a subject to appreciate its beauty. I think we're just in the wrong field for this specific form of art.
- MattGrommes 12y ago
  They really are different in real life if you've never seen them up close. As I understand, Rothko wanted people to stand right in front of them for awhile, to really have them take over your whole field of view. I never really "got" them until I did that, I was always much more aligned with you. As for photo realism, have you seen the movie "Tim's Vermeer"? It's a great look at a possible technique for that and the movie is very interesting.
  - douche 12y ago
    There was a large Rothko mural at the school I went to for undergrad, and I dated an artist who loved his work for several years. I remain unmoved. On the other hand, in one visit to the Berlin Alte Nationaegallerie, I saw paintings that I will never forget. "The Iron Rolling Mill", by Adolph Menzel, "In the Troops Quarters outside Paris," by Anton von Werner. The Blinded Samson. These are truly masterpieces, to my mind.
    - TheOtherHobbes 12y ago
      The irony is they're not really photorealistic. If you took a photo of those exact scenes you wouldn't get that look, because the light has been deliberately abstracted and exaggerated. They're actually more like vintage painted Instagrams, enhanced in an unnatural way for effect. E.g. The Menzel has obvious impressionist features, especially in the background and the smoke around the ceiling. The von Werner has very weird lighting, with a source behind the viewer, or possibly off to the left, or the right, and another equally bright daylight source from the room behind. This is not to be critical - they're both very good. But they both have abstracted light and form, and neither is a pure representation of physical realism. If you want photorealism, Van Eyck pretty much nailed it in the 15th century. Which is kind of the point with art - you get more points for inventing a new visual language, not for copying an existing one. That's why Picasso is so famous - he totally killed traditional representation when he was starting out. But it was too easy and boring for him, so he moved on to other kinds of painting and drawing. Modernism is partly about violently stripping away non-essentials, so first we had Guernica, then Rothko - and now we have Jony Ive and Material trailing along at the end of the trend, before everyone rediscovers 3D about five years from now.
alayne 12y ago
I really enjoyed seeing No. 14 at SFMOMA. Rothko's canvases are huge and there is a real warmth to them due to being hand-painted oil on canvas. These murals must have been a sight to see when they were in good condition. A lot of abstract expressionist and other experimental art pieces suffer from preservation issues, often due to unorthodox techniques and materials such as thick application of paint. It's too bad because you can't properly perceive the texture of real paintings and their sense of light and space when you look at a small wikipedia photograph on a backlit monitor.

59 points by nsns 12y ago

If you're around a Rothko, walk up to it until it fills your field of vision and stare at it without blinking. Within several seconds you'll notice it start to move as though it's alive. I think that you can gain more out of art and, perhaps, a particular artist if you understand their work in context. In this case, understanding what led to Abstract Expressionism and how it influenced artistic development.

qnaal 12y ago
>understanding what led to Abstract Expressionism and how it influenced artistic development You mean the CIA plot during the cold war, with the idea that it would make Russian art/culture seem dated when they didn't take it up? Or so I've heard...
- krapp 12y ago
  While the CIA did secretly fund the abstract expressionist movement and use it as propaganda[0], they didn't invent it out of whole cloth. [0]http://www.openculture.com/2013/04/how_the_cia_turned_american_abstract_expressionism_into_cold_war_propaganda.html http://www.openculture.com/2013/04/how_the_cia_turned_americ...
stan_rogers 12y ago
One gets the same effect staring at a wall that doesn't have a Rothko hanging on it. Or at a sufficiently large monitor with a static display. Leveraging persistence of vision might make an interesting series, but when it's the only trick the pony can do?
- alexandersingh 12y ago
  Oh I wasn't suggesting that it was unique to Rothko's paintings, though I think it works particularly well with the dense color fields.

nsns 12y ago

There are some details here about the way they've been using computer generated illumination: http://theconversation.com/how-we-restored-harvards-rothko-murals-without-touching-them-35245 http://theconversation.com/how-we-restored-harvards-rothko-m...

douche 12y ago

I know, I'm a philistine, but I have never understood the allure of Rothko paintings. Yay, colors in big blocks... I appreciate the efforts of painters who aspired to photo-realism in the age before cameras far more.

sanswork 12y ago
I feel the same way about a lot of art but then I think about some clever snippet of code I've seen and how to 99% of the population it probably looks like gibberish and realize that sometimes you require experience and knowledge of a subject to appreciate its beauty. I think we're just in the wrong field for this specific form of art.
MattGrommes 12y ago
They really are different in real life if you've never seen them up close. As I understand, Rothko wanted people to stand right in front of them for awhile, to really have them take over your whole field of view. I never really "got" them until I did that, I was always much more aligned with you. As for photo realism, have you seen the movie "Tim's Vermeer"? It's a great look at a possible technique for that and the movie is very interesting.
- douche 12y ago
  There was a large Rothko mural at the school I went to for undergrad, and I dated an artist who loved his work for several years. I remain unmoved. On the other hand, in one visit to the Berlin Alte Nationaegallerie, I saw paintings that I will never forget. "The Iron Rolling Mill", by Adolph Menzel, "In the Troops Quarters outside Paris," by Anton von Werner. The Blinded Samson. These are truly masterpieces, to my mind.
  - TheOtherHobbes 12y ago
    The irony is they're not really photorealistic. If you took a photo of those exact scenes you wouldn't get that look, because the light has been deliberately abstracted and exaggerated. They're actually more like vintage painted Instagrams, enhanced in an unnatural way for effect. E.g. The Menzel has obvious impressionist features, especially in the background and the smoke around the ceiling. The von Werner has very weird lighting, with a source behind the viewer, or possibly off to the left, or the right, and another equally bright daylight source from the room behind. This is not to be critical - they're both very good. But they both have abstracted light and form, and neither is a pure representation of physical realism. If you want photorealism, Van Eyck pretty much nailed it in the 15th century. Which is kind of the point with art - you get more points for inventing a new visual language, not for copying an existing one. That's why Picasso is so famous - he totally killed traditional representation when he was starting out. But it was too easy and boring for him, so he moved on to other kinds of painting and drawing. Modernism is partly about violently stripping away non-essentials, so first we had Guernica, then Rothko - and now we have Jony Ive and Material trailing along at the end of the trend, before everyone rediscovers 3D about five years from now.

alayne 12y ago

I really enjoyed seeing No. 14 at SFMOMA. Rothko's canvases are huge and there is a real warmth to them due to being hand-painted oil on canvas. These murals must have been a sight to see when they were in good condition. A lot of abstract expressionist and other experimental art pieces suffer from preservation issues, often due to unorthodox techniques and materials such as thick application of paint. It's too bad because you can't properly perceive the texture of real paintings and their sense of light and space when you look at a small wikipedia photograph on a backlit monitor.