Standing Female Nude Facing Left 

Mark Rothko made this drawing, Standing Female Nude Facing Left, with pen and ink on paper. Though he is best known for his abstract paintings, this sketch reveals an artist working within, and against, the established traditions of figurative art. Consider the history of the nude in Western art. For centuries, it was a way for male artists to explore and express ideas about beauty, desire, and the human form, often from a male perspective. Rothko's sketch, made in the United States, seems to both participate in and question that tradition. The woman's gaze and gesture complicate the dynamic of objectification typical of earlier nudes. To understand this work more fully, we might research the history of art education, the role of the nude in academic training, and the changing social attitudes towards the representation of the body in the early 20th century. Rothko’s exploration of the figure reminds us that artistic meaning is never fixed, but is always shaped by cultural and institutional contexts.