Volume 40, Number 20 · December 2, 1993
The Agonies of Success
By Jack Flam
Mark Rothko: A Biography
by James E.B. Breslin
University of Chicago Press, 742 pp., $39.95
The life of Mark Rothko was filled with unhappiness and ended in tragedy. Born in 1903 and generally acknowledged to be one of the most important Abstract Expressionist painters, he suffered decades of disappointment and neglect, and endured painful personal losses and crushing poverty before he finally achieved recognition. His work matured slowly, and it was not until 1949, when he was forty-six years old, that he developed the characteristic format and technique of the paintings that would establish his reputation—large, softedged rectangular fields of color applied in thin translucent washes so as to achieve a luminous, incandescent effect. Material success was even slower in coming, and Rothko's work brought little money until the late 1950s. And then, almost overnight, his situation changed drastically: his biggest problems were no longer poverty and obscurity but dealing with wealth and fame.
Review, 3818 words
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