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.

The Roman Temple Nobody Knows: Temple of Minerva Medica

 

Paolo Anesi, 18th century

The Temple of Minerva Medica, as it's called, is one of the most easily accessible ancient structures in all of Rome. It's right there on via Giolitti, the busy street that runs along the south side of Stazione Termini and the tracks beyond. Not far from Piazza Maggiore, and just a stone's throw from Santa Bibiana, the also-neglected baroque church whose facade was designed by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. 

A Yale University website describes the temple as "forlorn," and that description isn't inaccurate, in that the building is uncomfortably sandwiched between a streetcar line (and via Giolitti) on one side and a swarm of railroad tracks on the other. 

But it's also quite imposing, and reasonably well preserved for a 4th-century CE edifice. And it may be architecturally significant, in that (we read) its decagonal design, which included an oculus, occupies the architectural space between the octagonal dining room of the Domus Aurea--and the Pantheon. The Temple's dome collapsed in 1828, lasting only about 1400 years. The photo below makes it look like the oculus is still there--but it's only one of the arches. 

One might call it the Other Pantheon. 

So you'll want to see it, even if only through the fence by which it is surrounded. (Right, Dianne, wishing she could just walk in.)

The problem is that you won't be looking at the Temple of Minerva Medica. It's called that, yes, but only because, in the 18th century, a statue known as Athena Giustiniani (below) was presumably found there. That statue of the goddess had, and has, a snake at her feet. And because snakes were identified at the time with healing, the "Medica" name was affixed to the Temple. (Minerva is the Etruscan counterpart of the Greek Athena.) About the time the Temple was erroneously named, the artist Paolo Anesi painted the picture of it at the top of this post.

The misunderstanding all started with this statue. 

On Wikipedia and the like, the Temple of Minerva Medica is often described as a nymphaeum, or a "ruined nymphaeum" (as if there were lots of pristine ones around). Because the Temple is not mentioned (at all, apparently), in the ancient literature, no one knows for sure that the building was, in fact, a nymphaeum. That's only one theory among three. It may have housed a dining room, say some, although that seems a curiously minimal use for so large a structure. Others note that a heating system has been discovered beneath the floor, and that a sacred spring once ran under it, allowing the building to serve as a bathing facility for the elites of the day--though that use, too, is far from certain. 

In the right light and from the right angle, the Temple can look quite dramatic. 

Centrale Montemartini, the Ostiense museum that is #22 on RST's Top 40, houses two statues of Roman magistrates that were excavated from the Temple. 

Above: a recent partial restoration used a lot of new brick. 

Below: a newish storyboard, left, in English as well as Italian, provides some history of the Temple. Get there--if you can!--before the taggers render it illegible.

Bill 

Rome's "Other" Pantheon: Julio Lafuente's Little-Known Gem Is Now Decathlon

 

A rather weird interpretive perspective on the Air Terminal Ostiense. The ancient ruins in the foreground certainly don't exist where they are portrayed here, and never did. The composite photo
seems a superficial effort to recuperate certain ancient forms.

Many Romans will have experienced architect Julio Lafuente's Air Terminal Ostiense building, if only because since 2012 it's been the Rome home of Eataly. Eataly may have saved the structure from demolition, but damaged it by converting its enormous, hangar-like space into several department-store like floors. Today, it resembles a post-modern mall. (See photo, right.)

Decathlon's version 

Across the street from Eataly there's a more modest, circular building (see above)--so modest, in fact, that hardly anyone seems to know that it, too, was designed by Lafuente. Indeed, both buildings were designed for the 1990 soccer World Cup. The building's reputation may have suffered from its history. For a while it was occupied by a toy store--Rocco Giocattolli ("Rocco Toy Store"). Later, it was known by the letters that graced its roof--Balocco, a variety store that was a dark, messy, and somehow gloomy place that sold a variety of items nobody would ever want (and that we wrote about in 2016, not knowing the building was by Lafuente). See photos below.

Balocco, 2016. The elevator may have been original to the building.

We're surprised that this smaller building has received so little attention, because it has a back story that puts it at the heart of Rome's history.

Born in Madrid, Spain, Lafuente emigrated as a child to France. As a young man, he studied architecture in Paris, returning to Spain in 1941, when the Germans occupied the French capital and much of the country. Soon after the war ended, Lafuente returned to Spain to continue his studies. His education complete, he intended to travel to the United States, but instead opted for the "Grand Tour" of Italy, aboard a BMW motorcycle.

When he arrived in Rome, his life changed. Just a tourist at that point, he encountered the Pantheon. He was overcome by the building: its shape, and especially the oculus, which bathed the interior in natural light. 

In 1990, he took his Pantheon experience (adding a dash of the Coliseum) and used it to design his own Pantheon. Like the Pantheon, it's round. And, like the Pantheon, it has its own version of the oculus--a glass ceiling (and partial glass walls) that bring in natural light. It's now an outlet for one of the big box stores of sporting goods chain Decathlon, which has restored much of the building's architectural presence. From Pantheon to Decathlon.

Lafuente's 1990 structure. Now (above) a Decathlon store. 

And here's the rest of the story. Much taken with the Pantheon and with the city's roster of fine modern architects, Lafuente decided to make Rome his home. In looking for work, he visited the studios of Ludovico Quaroni, Mario Ridolfi, and the prolific Luigi Moretti (whose best known building may be the Watergate complex, in Washington D.C.). His search ended at the Studio Monaco-Luccichenti, where Lafuente felt most accepted. 

Lafuente had a distinguished career as a creative modernist, designing a number of buildings in Rome and environs as well as the Middle East. Among his best-known works is the Tor Di Valle Hippodrome, designed for the 1960 Rome Olimpiad. [His studio's website is still accessible - his daughter, Clara - still maintains the architectural practice -  and has many more photos of his work.]

We were first introduced to the Spanish-Roman architect in 2006 when there was an exhibition at Istituto Cervantes on Piazza Navona, celebrating his 50 years of his work. Lafuente was there; he was very congenial; and we had a great talk with him that opened our eyes to his works in Rome.

Hippodrome, Tor di Valle, 1959 (now "ex [former] ippodromo Tor di Valle")

Lafuente's 1980 Esso building (below), in the business park Parco dei Medici, will be familiar to anyone traveling the limited-access road to the Fiumicino airport. In June, our driver pointed out the building and explained how much he liked it. We think it's spectacular--one of the most interesting and innovative structures in Rome's orbit (we tried - and failed - to get inside it).

Among Lafuente's other area buildings are the offices of SAIE, on viale della Letturature 30, in EUR; Villa Fiorito (1965), an apartment house in the Aurelia Quartiere (via di villa Betania, 31 [photo below]; the Rome Church of Scientology (off via della Maglianella 375--Google street views suggests that the church is not visible from the road and is likely not open to the public); and the Stabilimento Ferrania (1959), a storied company famous for making the celluloid which the great neorealists used, active until the early 2000s [photo below]. The Rome complex, which Lafuente designed, is at via Appia Nuova 803, now part of Autocentro Balduina (an enormous car sales and service organization, with multiple outlets).

Villa Fiorito, Quartiere Aurelia 

Stabilimento Ferrania, 1959

Julio Garcia Lafuente died in Rome in 2013, at age 92. 

Bill 

Simone de Beauvoir in Rome

 

While reading Sarah Bakewell's At the Existentialist Cafe, I learned that Simone de Beauvoir and her life-long companion, the philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, had spent a good deal of time in Rome--a month or two every summer in the 1950s and 1960s, and some summers before and after, about which I have less knowledge.  I was intrigued.  I ordered two volumes of de Beauvoir's autobiography (each 400 pages): Hard Times: Force of Circumstance II, covering the years 1952-1962, and All Said and Done, covering 1962-1972.  

What I learned was not what I anticipated. Both Sartre and de Beauvoir were known as deep thinkers and careful, elaborate analysts, and I expected de Beauvoir to apply their considerable intelligence to the city of Rome, to enlighten me with one insight after another. It didn't happen. There's plenty of analysis in the autobiographies--of postwar Japan, or France's poisoned relationship with its Algerian colony (one of de Beauvoir's obsessions), of the social structure of Rio de Janeiro, and so on (the duo traveled relentlessly), and of the distress of growing old and contemplating one's death--but not of Rome, where they spent, cumulatively, several years of their lives. What was going on? What did Rome mean to these two brilliant intellectuals?

In some respects, Sartre and de Beauvoir related to Rome as other tourists--though they were not so fond of those "other tourists." Although de Beauvoir wrote that they had once enjoyed staying outside the city center, and did, in fact, once live in a hotel near Ponte Milvio, their preference was for the center (they would take a car from Ponte Milvio to walk in the old city).  One hotel was the Hotel d'Angleterre, just off Piazza di Spagna [named as such, because of its popularity with the British, and now known as "Hotel d'Inghilterra"]. Another was on the Piazza Montecitorio (the Albergo Nazionale), and still another, the Hotel del Senato, on the Piazza della Rotonda (overlooking the Pantheon). [All three are still operating.]

De Beauvoir (and sometimes Sartre) did some sightseeing, inevitably at sites frequented by those "ordinary tourists," and most of them in the city center. On the Aventine Hill, looking through the keyhole, de Beauvoir wrote: "so by fixing my attention upon a small corner of the earth, beyond it I see an entire country, together with its relationship with the world." With Sartre she visited the Castel Sant'Angelo, saw the city's Caravaggios, walked the Corso ("now made commonplace and ugly"), and waxed eloquent about the beauty of St. Peter's dome against the sky. 

Beyond the city center, they traveled to Hadrian's Villa, Ostia, Cerveteri, Orvieto, the Alban Hills and the new Roman suburbs ("a ring of concrete," in the words of Italian politician Giancarlo Pajetta, quoted approvingly by de Beauvoir). But seldom are these places worthy of more than a mention, of more than the name.  In 1968 and 1969, writes de Beauvoir, "we did not leave Rome at all, and it had never seemed to us more delightful....We walked about less than we had in other years because we had the feeling of being in all the streets and all the squares of Rome at one and the same time." 

Like other tourists--at least those of means--Sartre and de Beauvoir haunt the familiar squares. Coffee in the morning in Piazza della Rotonda; for a time, Piazza Sant'Eustachio (until it got too noisy and crowded); dinner in Piazza Navona or, later on, Piazza di Santa Maria in Trastevere; late evening whiskey in Piazza del Popolo; the "best ices in Rome" (a standard tourist trope) at a "little street near the hotel." In these volumes, at least, there is no mention of Piazza Vittorio, Monte Mario, the Gianicolo, Ostiense, Piazza Bologna, Monte Sacro, Garbatella, or EUR--Rome's marvelous 19th- and 20th-century neighborhoods. 

At the Pantheon--a favorite piazza 

De Beauvoir could be romantic, even poetic, about Rome.  In the early 1950s, she wrote:  

"Even when its bricks are being scorched by the heat of the ferragosto [the August 15 holidays when all of Italy shuts down], when the asphalt is  melting along the deserted avenues, occasionally punctuated by a solitary, useless policeman in a white helmet, we still feel comfortable there.  This great bustling, crowded city still calls to mind the  little town founded by Romulus.  'They should build cities in the country, the air is much cleaner,' goes the old joke; for me, Rome is the country.  No factories, no smoke; there is nothing provincial about Rome, but often in the streets, on the piazzas, one feels the harshness, the silence of country villages. The old designation 'people,' in which all factions were dissolved, really applies to the inhabitants of Rome, who sit in the evening along the Trastevere [her words], on the Campo de' Fiori, on the fringes of the old ghetto, at the tables on the wine merchant's terraces in front of a carafe of Frascati; children play around them; calmed by the coolness of the streets, babies sleep on their mothers' knees; through the fragile gaiety hanging in the air, impetuous cries rise up from below.  You can hear the popping of the Vespas, but a cricket sings as well." (There's more, but you get the idea.) 

De Beauvoir and Sartre were workaholics. Both were voracious readers (that was part of their "work") and prolific, usually every-day writers.  They were also well connected with various Italian and Roman left-wing networks--they knew Carlo Levi, Alberto Moravia (a terrible driver, by the way), artist Renato Guttuso, literary critic Mario Alicata, and journalists who pressed them for interviews--and these relationships took time. Their days were long but dominated by work: breakfast at ten (reading the newspapers, with the Pantheon as backdrop); writing or reading in the hotel until mid-afternoon ("we also spend many hours in our rooms"); a sandwich on the terrace; a brief walk; work until 5--and often into the evening.

Yet for de Beauvoir, Rome was a certain kind of workplace--a workplace melding into a vacation place, a retreat from frenetic travel and (sometimes) writing. "We were both," she wrote in the 1950s, "Sartre as well as myself, a bit worn out with all the traveling we had done; above all other countries we loved Italy, and above all other cities, Rome; so there we stayed."

For her, then, Rome was, at least in part, an escape. In Rome, she could ease up on being a committed (and exhausted) tourist, and ease up, too, on the writing. In the early 1960s she wrote: "[Writing] is still necessary for me, but sometimes I like giving myself a break from it: I do so when staying in Rome, for example, where I could have all the spare time I want to work....I read for hours when I am in Rome during the summer."  In language that sounds disarmingly simple, even simplistic, she describes Rome as "happy place....it's all so familiar, so happy, there's no need for words." "Rome" is for de Beauvoir a license to read (and not write) or, conversely, a license to return to writing: "Today," she wrote in 1958, "is very beautiful, very blue, I feel the happiness of being in Rome for a long time take hold of me again, and the desire to write. And I write." 

In All Said and Done de Beauvoir describes a variety of her dreams, including several that take place in Rome--"an agreeable place."  

Bill 

Waiting Out the Coronavirus in Ostia

Waiting Out the Coronavirus in Ostia

by Marcello Massatani (3/27/2020; photos likely 3/7/2020 or before)

This is the 4th in a series of accounts of living with the coronavirus in Rome and environs.  It takes the form of a letter/email to William and Dianne, the administrators of the romethesecondtime.com site. The author is Marcello Massatani, the genial and knowledgeable man who is usually at the front desk of the superb Anglo American Bookshop, Via della Vite 102, not far from the Spanish Steps in Rome.

Marcello has worked at the bookstore for many years--longer than any other employee. He lives in Ostia.  
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear William and Dianne,

I am very well and Healthy at the moment, and you?

I know in New York and in other parts of US, the situation is getting worse and worse because the coronavirus.

Here we are living a surreal situation. No one in the streets, all the shops are closed except grocery, supermarkets, newspaper stands and pharmacies.

Seems to be during a war, and yes we probably are in war, fighting against an invisible enemy.

Via delle Vite

Since the 7th of march the bookshop is closed (see photo at left of the street on which it is located), so it is almost a month that I cannot see Rome with my eyes but only on television, as I live in Ostia, just 30 km from Rome at the seaside. Also here everything's closed and we are allowed to leave home only to buy food and medicines, waiting your turn in long lines of people, taking care to be at the right distance from each other avoiding  any contact.

To be positive at the moment it is really hard, but personally I rediscovered the meaning of staying all day with family and share everything, doing gym [exercises at home; the health clubs are closed] in the morning with my wife, preparing lunch and dinner together (for the first time I did homemade gnocchi which were delicious), take really good care of my hobbies like magic, music, reading books, etc. Also the schools are closed and my son is taking online lessons from his teachers, discovering a new way to study.

All things that keep me from thinking about the terrible situation caused by the coronavirus. Many old and young People are dying with covid-19 so all of us could be infected by the virus if we do not respect the restrictions made by our Government and stay at home.

Inside the bookstore - when it was open.

Inevitably Italy will have a bad economic recession and I really don't know what will be the future for our bookshop and for everybody. I hope the Government will be able to give us a big help to start again. Same as after a war where a country has to rebuild everything step by step.

But in spite of everything, I am still positive about our future.

I look forward to see you again in Rome when the coronavirus will be only a bad remembrance for everybody.

All the best and stay well you too waiting for a global resurrection.

Marcello Massatani 

Along with his letter, Marcello sent a photo of Via delle Vite, where the bookstore is located (above), a photo of the inside of the bookstore when it was open, as well as photos of some of Rome's most famous attractions and spaces--likely taken before Marcello left Rome on March 7.  Here they are:

The Spanish Steps, with Santissma Trinita' dei Monti at top.

Piazza Navona

Piazza della Rotonda (Pantheon)

Campo de' Fiori

Looking toward Piazza di Spagna

Ancient Rome's Influence in Architecture RunsThrough Palladio

Palladio was fascinated with Rome's Pantheon's deep front portico and shell-like dome.

The thread tying 16th-century Italian architect Andrea Palladio (from whom we have the often-used name "Palladium") to Rome is thin but strong.  Palladio, like hundreds if not thousands of other artists and creators, was inspired by ancient Rome's classical buildings, in particular the Pantheon.

Palladio was also intrigued by the Portico d'Ottavio in the
ghetto of Rome, even designing a "conjectural reconstruction"
of it.

Palladio turned his interest in ancient Roman architecture into the immensely influential I Quattro Libri dell'Architettura  ("The Four Books of Architecture"), the first major work on architecture in Italian rather than Latin.  As one curator noted, "Palladio's book has probably exerted more influence than any other architectural treatise before or since."

The deep, symmetrical front portico and the shell-like dome of the Pantheon are the hallmarks of much of Palladian architecture.

One of Inigo Jones's first designs for the Queen's House London
(Greenwich) - showing the absolute symmetry in Palladio-
inspired design, symmetry that England loved.

St Martin-in-the-Fields in London, built in the early 18th century, uses the deep portico.  And, as our curator noted, "Churches based on this model have been built ever since."

The original US Capitol (burned by the British in 1814) "was in the Anglo-Palladian tradition and had a central Pantheon-type saucer dome."

St Martin-in-the-Fields, London, inspired by
Palladio and then a template for hundreds of
churches thereafter.

Inigo Jones and Christopher Wren in Britain were two architects who promoted Palladian forms.  Thomas Jefferson was also a devotee, as was Goethe.  The US Congress in 2010 declared Palladio, "The Father of American Architecture."

Vicenza on a hot July evening.

We mostly imagine Palladio in his home state of the Veneto, where Vicenza shows off his genius in what may be the most lovely piazza in Italy, and where his magnificent villas dot the Veneto countryside.  Yet it is his incredible influence that brings Palladio to mind almost daily in many countries.

Villa Barbara, also known as Villa di Maser, by Palladio in theVeneto

"Negro Church" - South Carolina, echoing the St.
Martin-in-the-Fields format.

Dianne

Much of the information and the architectural photos in this post are from an excellent exhibit at  the Royal  Institute of British Architects, London, "Palladio Design - the Good, the Bad and the Unexpected," with exhibition text by Charles Hind and Vicky Wilson.  That exhibit has closed, but the RIBA has frequent exhibitions featuring Palladio.

And a bit of modern Palladianism:  Town Hall, Padua, Italy, by Aldo Rossi, completed 1938.

Rome's Pantheon, and the Origins of Hitler's Great Hall of the People

On the 2nd page of a Martin Fuller essay in the New York Review of Books (12/17/15),  on the architecture of the Third Reich, I found this image:

Architect's rendering, the Volkshalle

It's an architectural drawing for what was intended to be the Volkshalle, the Great Hall of the People, the centerpiece of a project to transform Berlin into a city called "Germania."  What I saw, however, was Rome's Pantheon, or some version of it.  That's hardly a novel, or even an interesting observation. Almost anyone who has stood inside the ancient Rome building would have a similar perception.


Rome's Pantheon

As I was soon to discover, there is, indeed, a connection between Hadrian's Pantheon and the German architect Albert Speer's design for the Volkshalle.


Hitler's interest in the project dates at least to 1925, when he sketched an early idea of what the hall might look like, and it deepened in May 1938, when he toured the Pantheon as part of his only trip to Rome, where he met Mussolini and laid the groundwork for the Axis.


Hitler's admiration for Rome, and its Pantheon, surfaced again in 1940

Speer and Hitler, examining a model of Germania

when, with Speer and other German architects, he toured Paris and that city's Pantheon, only to be disappointed.  By that point, he imagined that his Germania would "only be comparable with ancient Egypt, Babylon or Rome.  What is London," he asked, "what is Paris by comparison?"

Well, Hitler was right about that, anyway.  But he and Speer--according to Martin Kitchen's recent book, a pedestrian architect with delusions of grandeur, and an evil man--had conceived of a project that even they couldn't pull off.

The overall plan for Germania included two grand boulevards (Mussolini, too, loved his broad boulevards), each 120 meters wide, lined with triumphal arches and

Imagining the exterior

grand buildings, including the Volkshalle.  As with Mussolini's Rome, the reconstruction of Berlin would have required tearing down hundreds of existing buildings and relocating tens of thousands of people.  Speer had designed the Volkshalle along stupendous lines.  While the interior skin of the dome resembled Rome's Pantheon, the German version was to have been much, much larger: 320 meters high; the podium on which the dome was placed was figured at 315 meters square, roughly the length of 3 football fields; the dome's oculus, at 46 meters in diameter, would, apparently, have been large enough to place inside the entire rotunda of Hadrian's Pantheon.  On top would rest an enormous eagle, holding in its claws a ball--the earth.  So subtle!

Hitler and Speer, who spent night after night mulling over plans and models of Germania, imagined a building in which Hitler would mesmerize the great throngs: 180,000 people at a time, most of them standing,

A rally outside

if the preliminary drawings are an indication. There was also a seating area along the sides, resembling the Congress Hall at Nuremberg--which, according to one source, was modeled on the Coliseum.  So large was the interior of the Volkshalle that even Speer, during time spent in prison after the war, speculated that so many bodies (and, therefore, so much humidity) in one great space would produce the dome's own "weather"--drizzle and rain.

Mussolini had grand plans, too, but he had the common sense to position his equivalent of Germania--EUR--in a largely undeveloped area south of the city center.  In contrast, Hitler's Germania was in the heart of Berlin.  According to one authority, had it been built, "Berlin's historic center would have forever been destroyed."


The dictators differed on their cities.  Mussolini was fond of Rome, and one could argue that his interventions, while hardly minimal and undeniably damaging, were designed to improve the city. Hitler, in contrast, disliked Berlin, most of whose voters had refused to support him in 1932-33. Germania was his revenge.  

Of course it wasn't built, nor was EUR completed until the 1950s.  The war intervened.  How sad!
Bill