Rothko, the "red" paintings, and Rome

Like his contemporary, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko was a figurative painter before he made his reputation as one of the great Abstract Expressionists of the postwar era. As the New York Times notes in a recent (March 18, 2026) article on a major exhibition of his paintings now mounted in Florence in multiple locations through August 23, both facets of his work were influenced by time spent in Italy: in 1950 (before his famous "red" color-field paintings), 1959, and 1966. The painting at the top of this post was accomplished in 1957.

Rothko was deeply influenced by two sojourns in Florence, where he was much taken with the frescoes of Fra Angelico at the former convent of San Marco, and with Michelangelo's vestibule in the Laurentian Library, both sites for the current Rothko show. 

What the Times doesn't say is that each of the trips to Italy involved substantial time spent in Rome, and that his time in the Eternal City may have been seminal in developing the color sensibility that was critical to his painting. 

Rothko

In 1950 Rothko toured the Forum with his wife, and overall he was impressed with the city's "layered" history, an aspect of Rome that would also directly influence the American architect Robert Venturi.

In 1959 he visited the Pantheon as well as Paestum in Italy's south. "I have been painting Greek temples all my life without knowing it," he commented. Visiting the Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii, he described a "deep affinity" for the "dirty" reds of Roman frescoes.  

Rothko

He was in Rome once more, in 1966, when he again admired the Pantheon and had the time (he was there for 2 months) to walk the city.

We're tempted to claim that Rothko's "red" paintings were a product of his time in Rome. The problem, based on our extensive walks in the city and environs, is that Rome's walls are not red. We can think of one exception--the "Red Hotel" in Garbatella. Had Rothko been enamored of Bologna, where there are many red walls, we might be closer to an Italian explanation for his famous "red" series.  

Rothko's famed red paintings may have been inspired by Matisse's "The Red Studio," (1911), which depicts the French artist's studio. Rothko was attracted to the painting.

Matisse, "The Red Studio"

Nietzsche's work was also influential, leading Rothko to think of red as a "blood-like" color that could convey the tragic side of human nature.

Bill 

For information on tickets to the principal exhibition at the Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, see here.

How Did They End Up Writing Rome Guidebooks?

That's us in June on Monte Velino, photo taken by one of the Italians in the
Italian hiking group.  This large mountain of several peaks is less than two
hours from Rome - to the bottom of the mountain, not the top.

For those of you who are still wondering how a U.S. History Professor, whose most recent book was about Patty Hearst, and a tax lawyer ended up writing guidebooks to Rome, you can check out an interview Lillie Marshall did with us recently.





Lillie, whose blogs, Web sites, and Facebook sites champion international teaching and travelling, asks some good questions, we found.  Like who paid for all that travel!

Check out the interview here: http://www.teachingtraveling.com/2013/10/28/rome-guidebooks/

That's us, finally in Rome, looking a bit the worse for wear,
 just after those 250 miles. That's our workhorse scooter,
 a Hexagon (made by Piaggio - the same folks who make
the Vespa - but it's considerably  larger).  It finally broke down
on us  a couple years ago and had to be replaced.

And here's one of the Qs and As:

TT: Tell us one moment from your travels that was particularly funny.

D & B: After the Fulbright, Bill wanted to go to different places and Dianne wanted to keep going back to Rome (as Dianne recalls). We compromised: We would go to Rome, but he would get a scooter and we would live in different neighborhoods (always outside the historic center) each time. We bought a scooter from one of Bill’s historian colleagues in the U.S. The scooter was in Bologna – 250 miles from Rome. We picked it up in Bologna; Bill drove it around the block; I got on back, and we took off over one of the curviest and scariest roads in Italy – La Futa – between Bologna and Florence. It took us four days, my shoulders were sore from being tense; Bill was exhausted from all the driving, but we made it to Rome. And we’ve been traveling via scooter ever since.

Dianne

A Scooter in/to Rome: Our Story

Bill on the Piaggio Hexagon, surveying the Futa, looking South 

It's been almost a decade since the idea of riding a scooter in Rome came into our heads--or, should I say, my head.  We had lived in the city for 6 months in 1993, and by 2001 we were taking shorter but regular trips.  Getting around efficiently--and stylishly--on a scooter had considerable appeal.  I thought it would be great fun.  Dianne knew the idea was insane, and she almost immediately announced what I'm sure she thought was an insurmountable barrier to my ambitions: she would consider a scooter, but only if I learned to ride one, officially--that is, only if I was certified to drive a motorcycle.  I had to have a motorcycle license. 

I had been on a scooter for two days 30 years before--the entirety of my experience--and I wondered if, at 59, I was too old to learn.  That summer,  I took a three-day motorcycle course:  on Friday, classroom instruction, focusing on safety, followed by a sleepless night, repeating in my head the complex, intimidating sequence of hand and foot actions (using both hands and the left foot) required to shift and downshift a cycle's gears; on Saturday, in a parking lot in the back of a derelict suburban shopping center, morning and afternoon sessions on a Honda 250: riding in ovals, turns, abrupt stops, "posting" while going over a piece of wood, figure 8's at agonizingly slow speed, hoping not to fall over; on Sunday, a parking lot driving exam (putting the bike down meant automatic failure) and a written exam.  I passed, and--the great benefit of this special program--earned my license.  But I had never had a motorcycle on the street.  (The following year, Dianne took the same course and earned her license - to her shock.)

Where could we find a scooter in Rome?  We could rent (see our previous post on Renting a Scooter in Rome), but that option seemed so expensive that we were unlikely to do it for more than a few days.  What happened next was pure serendipity.  I was teaching history at a state college near Buffalo and a colleague--native Italian, but a professor of Chinese history (let's call him Giovanni)--offered to "sell" us his Piaggio Hexagon, a heavy, powerful, 2-cycle machine (the kind that mixes oil with gasoline) that he was storing in Bologna, 250 miles north of Rome but also, coincidentally, a place we knew well; we had lived there for six months in 1993.

Because it's illegal for non-residents to "own" vehicles in Italy, our agreement was an unusual one: we paid $1400 and took informal ownership of the scooter; Giovanni remained the legal owner and agreed to be responsible for insuring the vehicle (at our cost).  He drafted a brief note, in Italian, granting us the right to use the machine as long as we did not do so under the influence of alcohol.  Giovanni gave me some basic advice about driving on Italian roads.

In Rome the following spring, we purchased helmets at one of the Porta Portese motorcycle shops, caught the train to Bologna, and found our way to the complex where the Piaggio was stored.  A friend of Giovanni's was waiting for us.  He started the scooter (we wouldn't have known how) and I, not wanting to put Dianne at risk until I had a little "practice," took it around the block--once.  After the three of us had a celebratory beer at a small cafe, Dianne took her place on that very soft and comfortable Piaggio back seat (the seat was comfortable; she wasn't), and off we went, pulling onto the busy multi-lane thoroughfare that circles Bologna's medieval core.  I think we were both anxious and tense, and I know I drove those first few miles in a posture of rigid determination, but we survived the first day.

With friends in Vado, ready for adventure

The following morning we ventured to a friend's house in Vado, in the mountains south of Bologna (photo at right), though how we got there--how we climbed those hills--I can't fathom.  Over the next three days we worked our way over the mountains and down the boot.  We survived the Futa (photo at top), a pass infamous for its dangerous curves, Dianne exhorting her driver to slow down and hug the shoulder.  When, even at that slow pace, this centaur crossed the center line and had to swerve to avoid an oncoming semi, the trucker blew his horn and wagged his finger.  Shame on me.




Dianne, in Vasari's loggia,
in Arezzo



We spent that night outside Firenze, totally psyched; the next  in Arezzo (an unplanned stop but necessary because of the cold rain), still psyched, celebrating our 2-wheel adventure in a romantic, wine bar below street level off Vasari's loggia (photo left).  Because of the limited storage space on our scooter, we carried our helmets everywhere (the "box" held underwear and toothbrushes and that was about it).  We stopped at Lake Trasimeno to track Hannibal's battle with the Roman legions, then turned west to the overlook at Montepulciano (yes, a glass of red wine) and the gardens of Iris Origo's La Foce before heading to a one-time luxrious hotel in hilltop Orvieto, where we got more practice in ascending and descending absurdly steep roads and parking our scooter in a real garage.  Then through medieval Viterbo and along the eastern ridges of volcanic lakes Bolsena, Vico, and Bracciano (amazing views, for Dianne only) to the outskirts of Rome, where in the late afternoon we found the frightening tangenziale (a fast-moving urban highway) and held ourselves together until we reached our exit and our destination: Piazza Bologna.  Minutes later, we asked a passer-by to take the picture below.    Bill

We felt like Hillary and Tenzing

New Frontiers in Found Art

We've always been fans of "found" art, if only because it doesn't require the hard work of regular art. No long days in the darkroom or studio. You don't have to be an artist. Found art is out there; it just needs to be found--and then picked up or, if that's not possible, photographed.

Our experience with found art began in Bologna in 1989, where we were living and where we had our first intense experience with the Italian passion for posters--and then for posters that had been torn and torn again, to reveal random patterns and layers of unintended meaning. The poster/photo on the left is from that period. Instant Robert Rauschenberg. This was easy.

Back in the States, Bill began picking up pieces of metal that been rusted and flattened from being out in the open and run over by cars. His first find was this paint can, pried from the Macadam on Delaware Avenue in downtown Buffalo. He was thrilled.

Rome is full of opportunities for the found-art connoisseur. We thought the phone booth at right, decorated by university students and located at the corner of viale Regina Elena and viale Ippocrate in the Piazza Bologna area, was ready for MACRO. And just across the sidewalk, at the back of some medical institute, we found a lovely pile of objects ready to be welded into high art.

The real frontier of Rome's found art scene, however, is the electrical box. Oddly ignored by the city's art elite, the electrical box has been "found" by movers, who have covered the boxes in delightful displays of "traslochi" stickers. This is by no means one of the best examples of electrical box art, but it should be sufficient to suggest the enormous potential inherent in these unusual metal canvasses. Watch for the upcoming show at Gagosian's. Bill