Understanding Rothko: An Art Advisor’s Personal Reflection

A personal journey into understanding Mark Rothko, the power of perception, and why we fear what we don’t understand - in art, life, and ourselves.

A NEW WAY OF SEEING

Why do we fear that which we do not understand -  in art, as in life? This notion has followed me for years. In the face of fear I have hidden, judged, misunderstood, and at the best of times, overcome that which I once did not comprehend. 

Art holds power. It is a statement, a truth, a defiance, a weapon, a protest, a confession. Art is many things, and nobody can tell you what to feel. Whatever the piece, whatever the message, you will discover it when you learn its language. 

And for me, Rothko was a mystery I desperately wanted to decipher.

STANDING BEFORE THE RED

https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/explore/collection/work/4319/

It’s 2024, and once again, I’m back at The National Gallery of Victoria, standing before Mark Rothko’s ‘Untitled (Red)’ (1956). I became obsessed with this painting long ago, not because I liked it per se, but because I couldn’t grasp what others saw and felt, and why I couldn’t perceive anything beyond rectangles of colour. I felt off-kilter hovering before this large work that seemed to know something I didn’t. What was wrong with me? All my studies, this whole universe I carry inside, and still I was missing something.

That same day, a class of primary school children sat cross-legged in front of the Rothko, listening to their guide, completely rapt, while I stood there perplexed. I walked to the other end of the hall, stood for a few minutes, pondered, gave up, wandered through other sections, and returned an hour later. Still nothing. 

WHEN A PAINTING WAITS FOR YOU

Nothing irks quite like that which we crave to understand but cannot. So I surrendered. I’d read somewhere that Rothko would switch off half the lights whenever he attended one of his own exhibitions, and if someone turned them back on, he’d quietly switch them off again as he left. 

Maybe the stark lighting of that hall at the NGV disrupted my experience and dulled my perception. I can’t be certain. Either way, dejected, I left. 

 

THE MORNING EVERYTHING SHIFTED

A few weeks later, summer and bushfire season was in full swing in Sydney’s Hills Rural District, and I happened to be driving one morning at dawn. It was still dark when I set out, heavy smoke hanging in the air beside an eerie silence, the kind that only a morning without birdsong can create. As I drove over a crest, I became completely awestruck. 

A haunting red line stretched across the horizon and bled into the heavy black cloak of night. It was an entire cosmos - a void without end. I felt myself swallowed into layer upon layer of black, brown, purple, red, blue. Mouth agape, eyes stinging, my very first thought was Rothko. 

I pulled the car over, grabbed a pen and paper from the door pocket, and scribbled down the following:

The Note: 

It is a new day,

An understanding

Stretches across the horizon,

Penetrates my being.

What form without form

What bruise without injury,

What colour without definition 

Is strewn across the sky

In the early hours of this morning?

An entire universe 

Behind,

Inside.

I feel the exquisite tragedy,

The restlessness,

The wordless beauty that only nature can express

And the artist dares to speak.

‘Rothko Sunrise’ ©, Dany M Hatem

https://portlandartmuseum.org/event/the-art-of-mark-rothko/

 

WHEN THE UNIVERSE OPENS

It was then that I shaped my own understanding of Rothko, and a whole new world opened unto me. This is the power of art. This is the universal language of beauty, tragedy, truth. This is how we are connected.

Oftentimes we are drawn to things - art, situations, people - without understanding why. In those moments, rather than question, we should sit with it, let it penetrate, be silent, and wait for clarity. It will come, and it is  worth every moment of discomfort that precedes it. Ignorance may be bliss, but knowledge is power, and understanding is the universe within.

 

SAME QUESTION, DIFFERENT ROOM

Last month I attended an event in Sydney held by Fuse Technology for Women in Leadership. They presented an extraordinary panel of speakers who shared the wisdom earned at the highest levels of corporate life. Among them was a rich diversity of backgrounds, and as they spoke about the glass ceilings they had broken, the deeply rooted sexist and racist environments they had pushed through, it raised the very same question: 

Why do we fear that which we do not understand?  

During the intermission, attendees around the room casually debated the question, and I found myself returning to that personal moment of recognition, and I shared this story. Prejudice is simply fear, and fear can be loosened, softened, even undone through understanding. 

It is more than art, it is the study of the self.

ABOUT MARK ROTHKO

Mark Rothko (1903-70) was a Russian-born American abstract expressionist painter, though he rejected the label. His works typically feature large rectangular fields of colour arranged vertically, parallel to one another. Rothko's saturated colours are emotive and meditative; though the effect they produce is often one of calmness and contemplation, they cost him enormous emotional effort. As he once said:

“I’m not an abstract artist…I’m not interested in the relationship of colour or form or anything else. I’m interested only in expressing basic human emotions - tragedy, ecstasy, doom and so on.”

 

YOUR PERSONAL JOURNEY

Visit https://thepoetsmadness.com/collections/all-artworks to explore our curated collections of original fine art, each chosen for its exploration of the internal and external structures that define human experience, an approach at the core of our curation philosophy. 

Read our previous Blog, How To Start Your Own Art Collection (Australia, 2025) https://thepoetsmadness.com/blogs/blog/an-exploration-into-sculptural-art

REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING

Rothko Images: Due to strict copyright laws, images are available via the links below.

1. Mark Rothko, Untitled (Red), (1956)

National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne

https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/explore/collection/work/4319/

2. Mark Rothko, No. 5 (Red, Black and Brown-Black), (Red, Black, Brown on Maroon), (1963)

Collection of Christopher Rothko

https://portlandartmuseum.org/event/the-art-of-mark-rothko/

3. Dany M Hatem, Rothko Sunrise ©, 2024

4. Stephen Farthing, Art The Whole Story, 2010

5. Stephen Farthing, 1001 Paintings You Must See Before You Die, 2006

6. Oxford University Press, The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists, Third Edition, 2003

7. Banner image, Rothko Sky. Clouds coloured red by a sunset. rothko stock pictures, royalty-free photos & images