Tag: score

Rothko Algorithm

Posted on by channing

“The progression of a painter’s work, as it travels in time from point to point, will be toward clarity: toward the elimination of all obstacles the painter and the idea, and between the idea and the observer.”

The recipe of a work of art – its ingredients – how to make it -the formula.

 

  1. There must be a clear preoccupation with death – intimations of mortality…Tragic art, romantic art, etc., deals with the knowledge of death.
  2. Sensuality. Our basis of being concrete about the world. it is a lustful relationship to things that exist.
  3. Tension. Either conflict or curbed desire.
  4. Irony. This is a modern ingredient – the self-effacement and examination by which a man for instant can go on to something else.
  5. Wit and play…for the human element.
  6. The ephemeral and chance…for the human element.
  7. Hope.10% to make the tragic concept more endurable. I measure these ingredients very carefully when I paint a picture. It is always the form that follows these elements and the picture results from the proportions of these elements.”

 

Mark Rothko Art Center https://www.rothkocenter.com/en/about-rothko/statement-about-art