Untitled c. 1946

Here's a Rothko, made with watercolor and ink on paper, and right away I'm thinking about the physical act of painting. Look at the way he’s built up these hazy, rectangular forms and how they hover and bleed into one another. It’s like he’s inviting us to witness the painting come into being, shifting and emerging through trial, error, and intuition. The paint is thin, almost like a wash, and the colors are muted—reds, grays, and blues. It makes me think about what he might have been thinking when he made it. There's an amazing conversation happening between the artist and the medium itself. He’s in dialogue with painters who came before him, and those who will follow. The drips and strokes are like embodied expressions, full of ambiguity and uncertainty, inviting us to bring our own interpretations to the surface.