“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.
- There must be a clear preoccupation with death – intimations of mortality…Tragic art, romantic art, etc., deals with the knowledge of death.
- Sensuality. Our basis of being concrete about the world. it is a lustful relationship to things that exist.
- Tension. Either conflict or curbed desire.
- Irony. This is a modern ingredient – the self-effacement and examination by which a man for instant can go on to something else.
- Wit and play…for the human element.
- The ephemeral and chance…for the human element.
- 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