Our focus is taken by a huge area of orange paint which dominates the top half of the canvas, with the background and lower half merging fairly closely with each other. Oranges and reds appear many times throughout the artist's career, particularly during his Color Field period and clearly he appreciated the vibrant impact that they could make when combined with each other. You will find them time and time again, such as in Orange, Red, Yellow, Untitled (Violet, Black, Orange, Yellow on White and Red), No.3/No.13 (Magenta, Black, Green on Orange) as well as Four Darks in Red. You could not describe the artist as either positive or negative because his work would take in both sides at different times, often using both within the same year, even the same month.
The Phillips Collection in Washington DC contains the exciting Rothko room, in which one can enjoy four different artworks, each carefully placed with plenty of space to breathe. It is as if the artist himself was behind the display, as this was exactly how he liked his work of this style to be presented to the public. In fact, we now know that the artist was indeed involved during the 1960s in helping the gallery to set up this particular display and would consult with them about setting up just the right amount and angle of light to best represent these particular paintings. The artist wanted to give some of his paintings to public galleries so that others could enjoy his work for many generations to come. He also collaborated with several other international galleries in order to spread his work across different locations and many still remain there today.
The Phillips Collection claims to be the first contemorary art gallery in the US, and has an exceptional collection to enjoy, whatever your artistic tastes. The venue was set up in 1921 and features art from around the mid 19th century up to the present day, making its scope a little wider than the term contemporary probably suggests. Besides the impressive Rothko Room, you can also find other key highlights such as Luncheon of the Boating Party by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, as well as a number of pieces from the likes of Manet, Cezanne, Gauguin and Modigliani. There are even some fantastic items from the old masters to be found here too, including El Greco.
