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Mark Rothko

Mark Rothko Quotes

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Famous Mark Rothko Quotes

“You might as well get one thing straight. I'm not an abstractionist... I'm not interested in the relationships of color or form or anything else. I'm interested only in expressing basic human emotions—tragedy, ecstasy, doom and so on. And the fact that a lot of people break down and cry when confronted with my pictures show that I communicate those basic human emotions... The people who weep before my pictures are having the same religious experience I had when I painted them. And if you, as you say, are moved only by their color relationships then you miss the point.”

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Author:Mark Rothko
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“We are concerned with similar states of consciousness and relationship to the world.. ..If previous abstractions paralleled the scientific and objective preoccupations of our times, ours are finding a pictoral equivalent for man's new knowledge and consciousness of his more complex inner self.”

IfsMenWorldSelfStatesConsciousnessFindingsConcernedComplexesObjectivesOur TimeAbstractionInner SelfPreoccupationStates Of ConsciousnessNew Knowledge
Book:Writings on Art
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“I will say without reservations that from my point of view there can be no abstractions. Any shape or area that has not the pulsating concreteness of real flesh and bones, its vulnerability to pleasure or pain is nothing at all. Any picture that does not provide the environment in which the breath of life can be drawn does not interest me.”

DoeRealPainInterestPleasureViewsEnvironmentShapesAreasBreathsBonesPoint Of ViewFleshVulnerabilityAbstractionReservations
Author:Mark Rothko
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“When I was a younger man, art was a lonely thing. No galleries, no collectors, no critics, no money. Yet, it was a golden age, for we all had nothing to lose and a vision to gain. Today it is not quite the same. It is a time of tons of verbiage, activity, consumption. Which condition is better for the world at large I shall not venture to discuss. But I do know, that many of those who are driven to this life are desperately searching for those pockets of silence where we can root and grow. We must all hope we find them.”

KnowsMenWorldArtAgeTodayGrowsLosesSilenceVisionConditionsActivityGainsRootsLonelyCriticsDrivenGoldenThis LifePocketsConsumptionVentureGalleryNo MoneyCollectorsGolden AgeNothing To Lose
Author:Mark Rothko
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“It is the poet and philosopher who provide the community of objectives in which the artist participates. Their chief preoccupation, like the artist, is the expression in concrete form of their notions of reality. Like him, they deal with the verities of time and space, life and death, and the heights of exaltation as well as the depths of despair. The preoccupation with these eternal problems creates a common ground which transcends the disparity in the means used to achieve them.”

WellsMeanProblemRealityFormUsedArtistCommunitySpaceDealsCommonAchievePoetExpressionDespairEternalDepthNotionPhilosopherObjectivesChiefsHeightLife And DeathConcreteTime And SpacePreoccupationCommon GroundDisparityExaltation
Book:The Artist's Reality: Philosophies of Art
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“The fact that people break down and cry when confronted with my pictures shows that I can communicate those basic human emotions.. the people who weep before my pictures are having the same religious experience I had when painting them. And if you say you are moved only by their color relationships then you miss the point.”

PeopleIfsHumansI CanFactsShowsReligiousEmotionBreakMissingCryColorPaintingDown AndMovedCommunicateBreaking DownHuman EmotionsReligious Experience
Author:Mark Rothko
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