. Houston Author(s): Stephen Polcari Source: The Burlington Magazine, Vol. 139, No. 1132 (Jul., 1997), pp. 505-507 Published by: Burlington Magazine Publications Ltd. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/887531 Accessed: 20-11-2015 23:29 UTC

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This content downloaded from 129.62.12.156 on Fri, 20 Nov 2015 23:29:26 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions EXHIBITION REVIEWS

72. Collageno.2, by Robert Motherwell. 1945. Paper and oil on carton, 55.1 by 37.3 cm.(National Museumof Ameri- can Art, Washington; exh.Centro de Arte ReinaSofia, Madrid).

73. Thehomely protestant(Bust), by RobertMotherwell. 1947-48.76.2 by 61 cm. (Private collection; exh. Centro de Arte Reina Sofia,Madrid). convulsions of the last years as The Hollow ence than did abstract expressionism. The Houston Men (FromT.S. Eliot)(1983) and Thegolden trouble begins when they are allied to the Mark Rothko bough (1986).4 At every stage Motherwell frequently derivative nature of Mother- had an exquisite colour sense. Although his well's vision. When he was most open about 1996 was the twenty-fifth anniversary of palette was limited (I counted only one use his sources, as in the early rectilinear works one of the most ambitious and ambivalently of green in the entire show), it was never that dramatise Mondrian's towering legacy, successful projects in post-War art, the monotonous. Nor does it seem to relate to the results are strongest. Elsewhere, the Houston Chapel for Human Development, the sensibility of his abstract expressionist debts to Still, Newman, Pollock, de Koon- popularly known as the . colleagues. Instead, the earthy harmonies ing, colour-field painting, hard-edge The chapel was the focus of Mark Rothko's vivified by the occasional swathe of orange abstraction and even, one surmises, modish last years of work before he committed sui- or sky blue and structured by black and 1980s neo-expressionism in the final years, cide in 1970. Seen as the climax of his white itself perhaps evince more affinity weigh against Motherwell's bid to join the career and following two earlier series - with, for example, late Braque (Fig.72). One first ranks of his time. Then again, he was projects for the Seagram Building, New wonders if Motherwell just longed to never far behind the frontlines. As this exhi- York (1958-60) and for Harvard University indulge in peinturepeinture (Fig.73). Then the bition proved with profuse evidence and (1961-62) - the Rothko Chapel consists of poetry could have taken care of itself. Yet he gusto, that was no mean feat. fourteen abstract paintings in a building was born into the wrong time and place to DAVIDANFAM inspired by the Church of Santa Fosca on let this happen. Torcello near Venice, a favourite building Consider the titles mentioned above. In 'Previously at the Fundaci6 Antoni Tapies, of Rothko's.1 Barcelona (13thNovember 1996 to 12thJanuary a famous statement, Motherwell once Reaction to the chapel has always been remarked that car- 1997);the show opened in Madridon 5thMarch. mixed. It was intended to be about or 'every intelligent painter Dore Ashton,Norbert light, ries the whole culture of in 2Motherwell.Essays by Lynton modern painting and FranciscoCalvo Serraller,and an annotatedcata- rather, about secularly sacred, inner illumi- his head' and this might almost be his own logue by Joan Banach.276 pp. incl. 79 col. pls. + nation, sacred space and sacred architec- epitaph, albeit in a rather less than positive numerousb. & w. ills. (Fundaci6Antoni Tipies, ture. However, while it is striking in its sense. Certainly the Pollock myth of an Barcelona,and Museo Nacional Centro de ArteReina austere meditativeness, the brilliant light of uncouth genius recklessly flinging out ges- Sofia,Madrid, 1996), $60. ISBN 84-88786-14-X (HB). Texas washes out the paintings in a raking exhibitionvenues are the Marsh Art turalist masterpieces should not be raised as 3The Gallery, incandescence for much of the day. Rothko a stick with which to beat down Mother- University of Richmond (September- November the of andthe of Universi- always preferred half-darkness gothic well's On the other 1997) Spencer Museum Art, so that his seem to intellectuality. hand, of interiors, paintings merge there looms the real threat of the artist as the ty Kansas, Lawrence(March- May 1998). Robert with or out of the Texas Motherwellon Edited emerge dusk; Hamlet of his elo- Paper:Drawings, Prints, Collages. by generation: endlessly DavidRosand, with essays by DavidRosand, Arthur chapel thus seems most frustrating. quent, hyper-sensitive and, too often, C. Danto,Stephen Addiss and MaryAnn Caws.208 It was important that Rothko was able to stymied as a painter by a mind that indeed pp. incl. 136 col. pls. + 33 b. & w. ills. (HarryN. help determine the architectural layout and carried the whole culture of the West within Abrams,Inc., in associationwith the Miriamand Ira thus, the environment for his paintings. The it. In other words, for 'painting' read Eliot, D. WallachArt Gallery,Columbia University, New chapel was an attempt to realise in architec- Frazer, Kierkegaard, Plato, Melville, Bau- York,1997), $60. ISBN 0-8109-4294-1 (PB). ture and a 'a modern mentionshould be made of Banach's light special place, delaire, Joyce, Kafka, Zen, existentialism, 4Special Joan sanctuary'. In keeping with his subject mat- scrupulousand informative documentation in the cat- Spain, Lorca, Lascaux and so on. The list ter throughout his life, Rothko sought to need not be enumerated further because alogueentries. make a numinous that a sacred 5In1978 I wroteto Motherwellwith a researchques- space, is, Motherwell did so for us.5 divorced from the and from tion aboutthe 'Subjectsof the Artist'group. To my sur- place profane Allusions of this kind are not in them- priseand delight he repliedwith a seven-hundredword everyday life. After passing through a selves worrying, especially since few styles of letter.This was entirelytypical of his style and the threshold (Rothko originally hoped for a art have sought a broader frame of refer- antithesisof thatof histight-lipped contemporaries. long entryway to the chapel) the visitor was

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work - Richard Etlin observes that there is absence, subjects that evoke the tragic sub- 'not merely the absence of light but rather lime without relief. In this room, Anfam the presence of a dark light, existing in its chose several canvases that illustrated both own right'.2 Form and formlessness join, Rothko's dampening down of his famous creating an unintentional debate with Bar- coloured light to one orange or dark white nett Newman and with Ad Reinhardt's bar, and the virtual extermination of his black paintings, by which Rothko was influ- earlier liveliness of brushwork and vitality of enced. inner squares and edge. Newman's Broken obelisk of 1963-67 This room was followed by one that pro- stands in a reflective pool outside the vided the compositional basis for Rothko's chapel. This sculpture turns unadorned triptychs in a study for the Seagram mural Egyptian funerary symbols of closure, con- series of 1958-59 (Sketchfor 'Mural No.7'; tainment and death - a pyramid and an no.1). This study sets up a wider and nar- obelisk - into an upward-thrusting and rower exposition of bands that, incidentally, open flow, matching and transfiguring make up the structure of the chapel. The metaphysical darkness. Newman also room also contained the first, more vertical- changes his generation's concern with frag- ly squared canvases and hard forms which ment - with 'brokenness' - into aspiration continued the effects of the first room. and hope, although not triumph. Like New- Gradually these darker, more absolute, and man's obelisk, Rothko's paintings turn more renunciatory pictorial effects took 74.No.2, by MarkRothko. 1963. Mixed media, 203.8 spiritual 'darkness' to inwardness, but not, over completely in the next room, which by 175.6cm. (Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; exh. as in Newman's case, transfiguration. The held seven of the 'black forms' (nos. 10-16), Menil Collection, Houston). chapel is used for different religious services Rothko's most Reinhardt-like canvases. and personal ceremonial events, which Here the inner square expands almost to the to enter a special realm of inner states of recall Rothko's early works such as Ceremoni- edge of the canvas, and begins to create the being. The chapel, and Rothko's paintings, al and the Sacrficeseries of the mid-40s. (Sig- piping effect of the chapel. However, all but pared away the indulgences of conventional nificantly, the word to 'sacrifice' means in its one of the canvases contain horizontal rec- ornamentation of architecture and figura- Latin roots to make sacred.) And, for all its tangles on a darker field, that is, they tion. In their place, the artist sought a prim- Christian shapes stripped of obvious icono- become plain and staunch, increasingly itive elementariness with stucco walls in an graphic references, the chapel is ecumenical geometric and primitive like an unadorned octagonal space, in feeling both classical and used for many different religious rites. stone pier. and Christian, and he filled the room with To celebrate the chapel's anniversary, Perhaps the most compelling room was stout and monumental paintings. Light, the Menil Collection, Houston, mount- the fourth. Here two huge canvases (nos. 18 however harsh for most of the day, would ed an exhibition of some thirty-eight and 19) in maroon, brown and plum moved pour down from above (like the descent of paintings and drawings narrating the devel- forward the 'black form' works of the previ- the 'Holy Spirit') and diffuse over the dark opment and choices of the chapel paintings ous rooms. While they are unfinished and floor and silent space, empty except for (closed 29th March). In a masterly exposi- more active in brushwork than the complet- humble benches. The chapel holds fourteen tion in six rooms and in the catalogue essay,3 ed chapel works, these paintings reveal the paintings mostly in plum, black and purple, David Anfam, the guest curator, laid out new format of monumental verticality, with six in two side-triptychs, three in a central Rothko's overall direction, narrowing his the interior squares either horizontal or ver- apse-triptych, one opposite the apse and focus on the painterly effects that Rothko tical or both in an overlay. Whatever their four on facing walls. The two side-triptychs used for the chapel. This is the fourth in a interior shape, these works are so tall and consist of three panels each in black with series of searching Rothko shows with massive as to be architectonic. plum piping, and with the central panel which Anfam, who is writing the catalogue Rothko's new triptych sketch dominated raised, echoing the format of Christian raisonn6 of Rothko, has been involved the fourth room. It seems close to the earli- altar-pieces and thus providing an iconic either as curator or essayist. The first two er Seagram sketch, but with an important effect in stripped-down form. The apse-trip- focused on the early work and the 'Multi- addition - a narrow painting in maroon has tych in purples has darker panel wings at forms', the last was a full retrospective in been placed at the bottom under the trip- each side and slightly lighter tones in the Japan. Each has been superb, revealing tych, and Anfam describes it as a 'predella' centre. Anfam's sharp eye and grasp of Rothko's (Fig.75). This narrow work consists of three Rothko's paintings in the chapel are in motives and production. In Houston he horizontal rectangles, the one in the centre discourse with the architecture, too. They produced a display that rivalled the exquis- having a semicircle taken from its bottom are architectonic in scale, the fulfilment of ite exhibitions organised by William Rubin edge, and two flanking smaller rectangles. the artist's lifelong search to wed human at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. All these shapes fall exactly under the verti- inner life to a culturally symbolic, envelop- However, unlike Rubin's Ad Reinhardt, cal, rectilinear planes of the triptych sketch. ing 'environment', thereby suggesting the Anfam's show, and especially the catalogue, The corners of the top edge of the forms of shaping of the individual by tragic and did not jettison thematic discussion. Indeed, the 'predella' are sharp, while their bottom powerful forces. Yet virtually all of these they brought it to the fore, and one realises edges are rounded. In this they again match works lack Rothko's characteristic inter- that meaning need not be ignored in exhibi- the triptych sketch. The suggestion that the action of interior shape. A dialogue pro- tions that emphasise what is now called narrow canvas fits the layout of the sketch duced by abstract rectangles, active or connoisseurship. Additionally, the Menil for the chapel is convincing, for, as noted, quiescent brushwork, and intense, project- conservator, Carol Mancusi-Ungaro, has Rothko had drawn from renaissance ing or receding colour and light formed the written an informative essay detailing how entombment compositions throughout his structure of Rothko's mature art. By the late Rothko painted the Chapel pictures. career. That he would consider making a 1950s, however, he had reduced the colour The first room of the exhibition, which predella, thus making another reference to interplay and by the mid-60s, the imma- was devoted to several paintings of 1963-64 traditional sacred representation, is com- nence of the brushwork. In the chapel, the (cat.nos.2-5; Fig.74), revealed Rothko's new pletely consistent with his modernism paintings are devoid of colour activity and concentration on darkness as his expressive informed by tradition. shape interaction; they are images of tool. In the catalogue, Anfam terms this new However, two things have not been immutability and pictorial density - blank, 'darkling vision' a modern tenebrism rooted noticed. While painted over, the tall planes unadorned and monumental. The visitor is both in old-master painting and in Rothko's of the sketch were once connected at the top thus enclosed and absorbed in symbolic renunciation of the slightest materiality in and bottom as the Seagram sketch once space that creates a sense of timelessness, order to realise a more austere vision. was. This connexion echoes the small, transcendence, luminosity and shadow. Indeed, the dark paintings of Rothko sug- decorative, architectural rectangles of the Writing about the principles of the sublime gest a further absorption than ever before in Roman Boscoreale frescoes from which in architecture - very relevant to Rothko's the artist's subjects of mortality, silence and Rothko had previously drawn for his

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doorway is even clearer although, for pic- torial and evasive purposes, Rothko could have intended it to be placed at the bottom of the sketch instead. If we see the triptych sketch as that of a door or maybe a window, Rothko is suggesting a threshold or place of passage, a frequent image in his much earli- er work. In the chapel, then, the apse-trip- tych would suggest a central doorway or place of passage to another realm, and this suggestion would complete the architectur- al references so central to the chapel paint- ings. The chapel thus articulates a series of passages away from the sensuous and mate- rial world and toward an interior and immaterial space. Completing this fourth room of the exhibition were seven pencil drawings (nos.20-26) for the apse- and side- triptychs. While there is no predella in any of them, they eventually narrow to the chapel's compositions. The last two rooms completed the studies for the chapel and illustrated their effects on Rothko's last easel paintings. Room five contained alternative paintings, mostly owned by the Menil Collection, all tall ver- tical canvases in black on maroon, with slight variations in the size of the inner hard- 75. ,by Mark Rothko. 1965. Mixed media, 289.8 by 455 cm. (ChristopherRothko and Kate Rothko edged square. They are completely archi- Prizel Collection; exh. Menil Collection, Houston). tectonic pictorial wall paintings - paintings as public/private monuments - in them- abstract compositional scheme. The Sea- work, up until and through his abstractions. selves. Rothko considered but then rejected gram and chapel sketches also suggest These references signified tradition and its them - although he made one for the chapel architectural forms in their rectilinear inescapable enclosure of the viewer or indi- directly opposite the apse. (In the exhibition planes, which evoke both open and blocked vidual figure. If there is an allusion to clas- and catalogue, there is no discussion of the rectangular doorways, portals, or windows. sical architecture here, the predella is roots of Rothko's utterly formless paintings The 'predella' semicircle and two hori- suggesting that the wider plane in the centre eventually chosen for the chapel.) zontal planes extend these architectural ref- of the sketch is a door and the narrower side The final room contained several late erences with an indirect notation of the top planes are side-walls or the tops of support easel paintings (nos.33-38; Fig.76) in which of a classical or rounded-arch renaissance columns. I think this works even better if the the shapes are closer in scale, the brushwork doorway. Rothko had made cryptic allu- predella is moved to the top of the sketch, tighter, more uniform in shape, and less sions to classical architecture throughout his where its possible reference to a central energetic and interactive than before. Thus there is less metamorphic life expressed as active brushwork and more of the hard- edged impersonality of the 1960s evident in several artists working in reaction to Rothko's war-generation intensity and unease. By the time of his death, Rothko seems to have completed his passage from the everyday to a nether, almost impenetra- ble, immutable realm. The last easel paint- ings are informed by a sensed, interior black silhouette that reflects not the absence of light but sobriety and portentousness itself. STEPHEN POLCARI ArchivesofAmerican Art, JVNewYork

'The Churchwas part of an ensembleincluding a bap- tistryand cathedralthat was designedto symbolisethe Christiancycle. That is, the baptistryrepresents birth, the cathedralthe maturelife, and the church,in which lies an entombed martyr, death and passage to par- adise. Rothko's art is founded on this cycle as mytho- ritualprocess, as was much of AbstractExpressionism. See s. POLCARI:Abstract Expressionism and theModern Expe- rience,New York [1991]. 2R.A. ETLIN: SymbolicSpace/French Enlightenment Architec- tureand Its Legacy,Chicago [1994], p.198. I am indebt- ed to Etlin'sdiscussion of the sublimeand architecture. 3MarkRothko: The Chapel Commission. By David Anfam and CarolMancusi-Ungaro. 32 pp. incl. 8 col. pls. + 12 b. & w. ills. (MenilFoundation, Houston, 1996).ISBN 0-939594-38-2. The Menil Collectionalso published 76. Untitled,by Mark Rothko. at the same time TheRothko Chapel Paintings. Origins, 1968. Mixed media, 233.7 by Structure/Paintings.By Sheldon Nodelman. 359 pp. incl. 175.4 cm. (GalerieBeyeler, 21 col. pls. + 96 b. & w. ills. (Universityof Texas Press Basel; exh. Menil Collection, and the Menil Collection,Austin and Houston, 1997). Houston). ISBN 0-939594-36-6 (HB);0-939594-36-4 (PB).

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