Rothko at Tate Modern

Mark Rothko, Untitled 1958. Kawamura Memorial Museum of Art, Sakura. © Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko/DACS 1998. http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/markrothko/interactive/room-3.shtm

Never so dark a room in a gallery.

Well, that's an exaggeration, considering how many films are exhibited. But for paintings, it is rare to find a gallery so dimly lit. Even the notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci generally receive more lighting.

Rothko is famous for his chapel-like spaces, dimly lit. Although the main room in the Mark Rothko exhibition at Tate Modern in London is filled with a series of paintings designed for the Seagram Four Seasons restaurant in New York, it is hard to imagine dining at that light level - without additional candles, it would have been difficult to see the food. Perhaps that's one reason why the commission was never installed in its intended location.

And yet it helped to imagine that I was about to dine. I sat down on one of the folding chairs, so necessary for extended contemplation at just the right distance and angle (as much as possible - I really thought everything in that room was hung way too high, compared to how Rothko himself had viewed the paintings, resting on the floor - the base of each painting was at or above head height). And thus seated, somewhere in the middle of the room, I imagined myself about to dine, and took in the room in its entirety for the first time, as if casually glancing round before focusing on the soup.

It was only then that I had the impression of the room as a single unit, a single work, with me inside it.

The realisation was a jolt, but of what, it is hard to say. It was at once peaceful and oppressive. All the intense concentration that I had lavished on each painting individually was gone. One painting flowed into the next, and the people in the room seemed part of the paintings, rather than an intrusion (down in front!). I had already noted, with some amusement, how the room seemed to attract people wearing black and maroon, like a chromatic magnet. It wasn't just the gallery assistants that were in these colours. There was a man in a black jacket, with a maroon scarf. A lady in a maroon kaftan. Men in black jumpers with, yes, maroon ties. And most striking of all, a girl in a tight floor length maroon dress, with a black bolero type jumper. It was really uncanny.

Anyway, the idea for the integrated viewing of the room as a whole only came to me on a second visit. It is funny how I seem to have established a set way of looking at pictures. I suspect I am not alone in this. Rothko's later work seems to demand to be viewed this way. Each theme is repeated in so many variations, and sometimes with the intent that they all be shown in the same room, that it is impossible not to. So instead of each work being a window into one or more windows of colour, each room is filled with multiple windows, each opening onto one or more windows of colour, a sort of metaphor for the multiverse, or a series of alternate variations or possibilities arising from a single moment. If I look up, in the same room, at the same moment, but with a slightly different thought, and a slightly different shade between smiling and frowning on my face, and you react slightly differently, how subtly varied these alternate universes can be.



Mark Rothko, Red on MaroonMural, Section 2 1959Tate. Presented by the artist through the American Federation of Arts 1969© Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko/DACS 1998
http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/markrothko/interactive/room-3.shtm

Going back to the single paintings, I experimented with regarding the innermost squares as holes, and the squares around them as windowframes, suspended in empty space that reached to the edge of the canvas. Most of the canvases depicted single squares within squares. But I could also see the central squares as solid forms, the 'frame' square around them as the empty space, and the colour to the edge of the canvas as another solid form.

Where there are two 'windowpanes' in the picture, as in Unitled 1958 (top of this page), I could see two standing forms, or alternately, two slits in a frame. If it was two slits, I was immediately put in mind of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, and ways of testing whether a photon (light particle) would pass through one or the other slit in a screen, and how the interference pattern produced showed that there was no way of determining which slit a particular photon would pass through: effectively, the photon passes through both, simultaneously.

Sitting there in the near-dark, watching these photon-screen forms/not-forms, I finally realised that there was no correct angle to view the paintings from - I have spent my life leaning my head this way and that in front of oil paintings, trying to avoid the 'glare spot' so as to see the entire painting uninterrupted - because Rothko created these mature paintings in mixed media, some layers with oil, some with acrylic, some with shiny egg glaze. So if you see it from one angle, the 'frame' shape might glow 'positively'. And seen from another angle, the same shape slinks darkly into the background, becoming 'negative'.

Shapes that exist both as forms, and as negative spaces between forms. Being and not being. Everything and nothing, as eternity and no time at all.



Mark Rothko, No. 1 1964. Kunstmuseum Basel. © Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko/DACS 1998. http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/markrothko/interactive/room-6.shtm

More on Heisenberg, single and double slits:

Quantum physics single slit experiment (under 3 minutes). This is amazing - you actually see with your own eyes (never mind all you who will insist that all films are constructed).

BBC Quantum Physics for Dummies (with double slit experiment) (under 10 minutes)

Quantum physics: is light a particle or a wave? (under 7 minutes)

Text explanations of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle

Animated explanation of the two slit experiment (not as convincing as seeing film footage, but very clear)

The double slit experiment, without narration (under 30 seconds)

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Cildo Meireles at Tate Modern

Cildo Meireles, Through (detail), 1983-89/2008, copyright courtesy the artist, photo: Tate Photography

A worthwhile addition to a visit to the Rothko exhibition at London's Tate Modern is an exploration of the work of Cildo Meireles.

Numerous installations by this pioneering Brazilian conceptual artist offer the viewer many different levels of experience. Even if you don't normally like contemporary art, there is a lot to choose from here. And the experiences vary from thought-provoking to surreal to just plain fun to, well... I shouldn't spoil it for you, if you go, but at least one of the installations is bound to provoke strong reactions, and without the use of sex, violence or swearing. More on this later.

Don't despair, reluctant contemporary art viewers, if the first room seems a little hardcore (documentation of art 'happenings' from the 1970s which appear to be moving bits of earth into boxes, and photographs of the results, Coke bottles with varying amounts of Coke, etc.). Even here there are details to amuse, such as the currencies for zero dollars / pesos, etc., in one case poignantly displaying a member of one of the dispossessed native peoples. And it is here that one begins to get a feel for what Meireles is about: he is passionately concerned about the exploitation of these people. The more you read of the exhibition labels, and watch the video documentary at the exhibition exit, the easier it is to understand the work. Whether or not great art should need contextualisation (especially if created within living memory), or should be able to convey meanings and emotions unaided, is another debate.

Moving into the next room, the visitor is confronted with a large number of installations, and doors leading to still more. Of these, Mission/Missions (How to Build Cathedrals) (1987) is accessible and powerful without further contextualisation, though I did have to speculate as to what material was used to form the central shaft - even my erroneous first guess did not detract from the piece. (Answers to this and other spoilers at the bottom of the page.)

Through (1983-89/2008) was also very powerful, and people seemed to be enjoying walking through it. It is set up as a kind of maze created by all kinds of fences and barriers (shower curtains, barbed wire, velvet ropes from cinemas, etc.), at the centre of which is a brightly illuminated ball of cellophane of superhuman proportions. The way through the maze involved walking over a large expanse of multiple layers of broken glass, not for the barefoot or stiletto-clad! The experience was reminiscent of walking through Lucas Samaras' Mirrored Room - that glass-green light, that fear of falling through the floor. I suppose I could have read about Meireles' intentions, but it didn't seem necessary: to me, the piece seemed like a metaphor for the human heart, trying to protect itself, fearful and easily broken, ultimately transparent and gloriously illumined. I suppose there is a large range of other meanings one could attach to it, including ideas about the ubiquitousness of barriers in modern life, the proliferation of street furniture, etc. At any rate, people seemed to enjoy two of the barriers in particular: identical fish tanks, populated with translucent fish. My metaphors and meanings begin to fall apart when I try to integrate the fish into my interpretation of the piece, so I'll leave that to you.

There was a bit of a queue to enter Red Shift, where only six persons are allowed in at a time. Most people responded initially with surprise and delight, at entry to the first room. (I didn't realise until later that I could have looked into the refrigerator.) Does anyone else remember red 45s? My parents had one kicking around, which fascinated me as a child. Many similar delights await, in this room beyond even Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen. The second part of this installation is more disorientating. I found it not unpleasant to lose track of distance and perspective. Some might be slightly offended by what you find at the end of the room; to me, it seemed in keeping. The whole thing, in the end, will be washed away.

Pleasant disorientation, however, is not how I would describe the effect of the final piece, Volatile (1980-94). After a very long queue (one of those folding seats came in very handy) we were allowed in, in groups of four, after warnings about pregnant women, etc. wanting to think twice about going in. Shoes and socks off, okay. Wellingtons were provided in the anteroom. The only pair left were men's and much too big for me. This was not a problem.

The problem, for me, was that I found entering the installation proper absolutely terrifying, on a level I hadn't expected. Suffice it to say that this piece, though simple, is quite powerful. Other people seemed to find it a pleasant experience. They went in barefoot. Do not, I advise, wear clothes that you mind getting a little messy. And I wouldn't bring toddlers or small people with respiratory sensitivities to this one. If you are going to the exhibition, stop reading here.

Cildo Meireles, Babel, 2001. Photo: Tate Photography






Spoilers, now, and for those who know they won't be in London before 11 January, when the show closes.

Mission/Missions (How to Build Cathedrals) (1987) had a central shaft formed from communion wafers.

And now for the Volatile experience. After the shoe-changing antechamber, you pass through a door into a room so dark that you can barely see that the floor is completely covered in at least eight inches of talcum powder. The powder is stirred up into a smog.

Although I had a sock clamped over my nose and mouth, it was almost impossible to breathe. Although I have grown up in what they call the 'snow belt' and am used to lurching about like a penguin, I found it almost impossible to walk.

Clutching the partition wall, I peered round the corner. A single candle, upright, burning, on the floor, barely visible through the smog.

I found this utterly terrifying. Not because I might fall over. Not because I wasn't sure whether talcum powder was flammable. Not because I really couldn't see. I was prepared for all this.

What I wasn't prepared for was the overwhelming feeling of claustrophobia. Not from the walls outside me. A sickening closing in from inside myself.

My own lungs were the location of my claustrophobia. And in that moment, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to draw enough breath to get back out the door.

Of course I played down my fears to the guard, who probably hadn't seen anyone bolt out so quickly all day. He asked me quite a lot of questions. I assured him that I was all right, just startled (and by implication, unlikely to sue the gallery).

Some people said it was quite a nice sensation, talcum powder between the toes. And so it might be. I didn't miss it. For me, it was beyond an experience of the sublime, the comfortable feeling of being scared but knowing you are safe, as on a roller coaster, or as people of the eighteenth century confronting a mighty waterfall.

This was an experience of the terror of not knowing whether I had gone too far to come back.


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Bacon & Rothko at Tate

image copyright the Estate of Francis Bacon/DACS 2008, from Tate Britain website

It would be no understatement to say that in the last few days I've learned everything I need to know about painting from Bacon and Rothko - that is, everything I need to take me into preparing for my degree show this year. Not to say that I won't happily consult my tutors, but it feels as if there are a large number of significant ideas floating round my head, thanks to these two.

Even if you're not preparing for an art school degree show, I cannot highly enough commend these two current excellent exhibitions at Tate Britain and Tate Modern in London. If you have any interest in either artist, I absolutely recommend that you go, and go soon (Francis Bacon ends on 4 January 2009, and Mark Rothko on 1 Februrary).

While you're there, you can also take in the Turner Prize exhibition (at Tate Britain, until 18 January) and Cildo Meireles (at Tate Modern, until 11 January) - tasty sidelights that all in all make the London Tate experience worth a two day break, and almost in themselves justify becoming a Tate member. Because the Bacon and Rothko both repay repeated viewing. The more you see them, the more there is to see. The more you know about them, the more there is to see. And there is ample opportunity to know more, whether from the excellent audio guides, the TV clips of Bacon playing at two separate locations in Tate Britain, or from browsing the large selection of books on both artists in the ubiquitous Tate shops.

Okay, I'll stop raving and step back a bit. I went to London to see these shows on a School of Art trip. Unfortunately modernism lecturer John Harvey became ill at the last minute so was unable to offer his knowledgeable commentary to add to the experience, and to cap it all I missed the early train after driving uncharacteristically slowly to Aberystwyth due to icy roads. Sympathetic rail employees in the waiting room began an extended discussion about the nature of modern art, which focused largely on the idea that modern art could be interesting, providing there was some evidence of craftsmanship or skill. So take note, School of Arters. People are willing to give our stuff a chance, but not if they think we've just thrown it together without any thought or skill. Or just flicked a light on and off.


from Rail Journey (Aberystwyth to London)

Finally it was time for the next train. Having been duly serenaded with the rail employee's version of 'We're all going on an - arty holiday!' I boarded and spent a pleasant journey doing a little photography (more results to follow, on Facebook and here). I did my own thing then had an early evening at the hostel, unintentionally frightening the other SoA girls booked into my room ('Whose coat is that?!' 'It's me!' I said, raising a sleepy head.) And the next morning it was... Bacon after breakfast!

The Tate Britain Francis Bacon exhibition brings together a large range of his work from about 1945 (very little survives from before this time, as Bacon was ruthless about destroying or 'losing' work that didn't satisfy him). There are a number of the screaming popes, and screaming businessmen, and the triptych crucifixion that cemented his reputation. Now I began to ponder these businessmen, in their outline cubes. Fish tanks, perhaps. Tesseracts, a portal to another dimension. The answer came in the exhibition catalogue and the Arena programme screened by Room 19: the bulletproof glass screen used for trying the leading Nazi criminals after World War II. Except, the trial with the glass screen took place in 1961. Things kept behind glass: taxidermy, stuffed dead animals. Shop mannequins. Zoo animals. Things we need protection from. Things that need protecting. In the later triptychs, enclosing the precious moment or persons. Dangerous and in need of protection at the same time. The glass globe for the Rose, in Antoine de Saint-Exupery's Le Petit Prince. Bacon said he was looking for ways to take the image out of the plane of the picture. Hence also the circular raised dais used in so many mid- to late paintings: a stage, an altar, one of those rotating platforms they used to use in car showrooms. Here is the private, on display. The ecstasy, the wounds, the grief. There to worship, or to observe as voyeuristic consumer. There are many other potentially religious/materialist aspects to the work that make the Bacon exhibition a nice counterpoint to the Rothko (or vice versa).

The long and the short of it is, that I spent a very, very long time with Bacon, and quite a long time with Rothko, and I saw Runa Islam's Be the first to see what you want to see when you see it (2004) a number of times, and Cildo Meireles once (properly). And there is so much more to talk about that I will go and digest my Bacon for a bit longer, before writing further.


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