New Mags Mark Rothko: Paintings on Paper Book

Mark Rothko created over 1,000 paintings on paper. This book explores these often overlooked works and provides new insight into his artistry.

Mark Rothko (1903–1970) is known for his impressive abstract paintings on canvas; joy, despair, ecstasy, and tragedy are some of the themes he sought to express in his brilliant works. Despite Rothko's prominent position, few know that he also created more than 1,000 paintings on paper during his career. For the artist, these were not just preliminary sketches but finished paintings in themselves.

These remarkable paintings range from early figurative motifs and surrealist works to the softly edged rectangular fields, often in monumental sizes, for which Rothko is most famous. These works challenge our expectations of how painting is defined and popular ideas about Rothko and his career. In this beautifully illustrated volume, Adam Greenhalgh traces the role these works played in the artist's reception, reputation, and success.

The book follows the first major exhibition dedicated to Rothko's works on paper in forty years and brings together nearly a hundred brilliant, rarely shown examples. Built on the important research that Greenhalgh and his team conducted for the catalogue raisonné of Rothko's works on paper, this important catalogue offers a new appreciation of an undervalued aspect of the artist's practice.