Att förstå Mark Rothko

Tråkigast på gallerier och konstmuseum är verk av Mark Rothko. De hänger där tillsammans med andra abstrakta expressionister, popkonstnärer och minimalister.
Utan särskilt intresse spatserar man förbi en tre fyra identiska oljemålningar av Rothko och tänker - jaha, där hänger en Rothko, cred till mig för att jag kände igen vem som gjort den utan att behöva gå fram och läsa på den lilla lappen och cred till museet för att de förvärvat en banbrytande amerikansk konstnär.

Despite fame, Rothko felt a growing personal seclusion, a sense of being misunderstood as an artist. He feared that people purchased his paintings simply out of fashion, that the true purpose of his work was not being grasped by collectors, audiences or critics. He wanted his paintings to move beyond not only classical art, but abstraction as well. For Rothko, the paintings were objects that possessed their own form and potential and therefore, must be encountered as such. Sensing the futility of words in describing this decidedly non-verbal aspect of his work, Rothko abandoned all attempts at responding to those that might inquire after its meaning and purpose, stating finally that silence is "so accurate." His paintings’ "surfaces are expansive and push outward in all directions, or their surfaces contract and rush inward in all directions. Between these two poles you can find everything I want to say."

"The fact that people break down and cry when confronted with my pictures shows that I can communicate those basic human emotions.. the people who weep before my pictures are having the same religious experience I had when painting them. And if you say you are moved only by their color relationships then you miss the point."

Rothkos manifest
"1. To us art is an adventure into an unknown world, which can be explored only by those willing to take the risks.
"2. This world of imagination is fancy-free and violently opposed to common sense.
"3. It is our function as artists to make the spectator see the world our way not his way.
"4. We favor the simple expression of the complex thought. We are for the large shape because it has the impact of the unequivocal. We wish to reassert the picture plane. We are for flat forms because they destroy illusion and reveal truth.
"5. It is a widely accepted notion among painters that it does not matter what one paints as long as it is well painted."

OK, bara för att de utgör den minst anmärkningsvärda och tråkigaste delen av utställningen behöver de kanske inte vara helt ointressanta? Om du gick in i ett rum och där hängde bara en tavla, och det var en abstrakt expressionistisk Rothko skulle du kanske också uppleva en anstrykning av våra mest grundläggande känslor: tragedi, exstas, ödet, vem vet?