Untitled 1945 - 1946

This Untitled work on paper was made by Mark Rothko, sometime in the mid-20th century. He's using watercolor, graphite, and ink, and the way he lets them mix and mingle tells me he’s thinking about artmaking as a process. Look at how the watery blues and grays bleed into the stark whites, and the spidery quality of the ink work dancing over the top, like a doodle in a dream. There's texture, sure, but it's mostly about the way the colors interact. Those reds floating amidst the cool tones remind me how color can be both assertive and elusive. Then there’s this little half-circle of black up on the top right, all by itself – a curious little mark that pops out, asking us what it's doing there. It’s like Rothko is having a conversation with himself, or maybe with us, about what it means to make a mark, to leave a trace of thought and feeling. It makes me think of Cy Twombly, with that similar sense of letting things be unresolved, inviting us to fill in the gaps. It’s all about embracing the ambiguity, letting the questions linger, and letting the art be a space of endless possibilities.