The making of Mark Rothko's Harvard Murals

Stenger, Jens; Khandekar, Narayan; Wilker, Annie; Kallsen, Katya; Kirby, Daniel P.; Eremin, Katherine

doi:10.1179/2047058415y.0000000009

Cited by 11 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…Chemical compounds of the same pigment lake class, PR 49 are also found in a faded condition in contemporary paintings. [ 79,80 ] This evidence highlights the poor light fastness of the β ‐naphthol lakes and BONA pigments, but the photochemical stability and degradation mechanisms of the pigments in paintings and plastic are not thoroughly understood.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The identification of synthetic organic red pigments in historical plastics: Developing an in situ analytical protocol based on Raman microscopy

Angelin

Sá

Picollo

et al. 2020

J Raman Spectroscopy

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The identification of colorants in historic plastics is a methodological and analytical challenge. Although deformulation is performed by the plastics industry, in the case of historical objects, sampling is often impossible, and in situ protocols are needed. The accurate identification of colorants provides insights into historical plastic formulations, supports planning of conservation studies, and critical data for objects that already exhibit color change (e.g. fading). Indeed, colorants may degrade following exposure to light, and color changes have been reported for plastic objects. The analysis of colorants remains a challenge, and microsampling is usually required. Successful identification of red pigments from thirty historical plastics is reported following a new in situ analytical protocol based on Raman microscopy. Information about other pigments, fillers and plastic polymers are reported. Fading has been observed in the historical plastic objects containing Pigment Red 53.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The identification of synthetic organic red pigments in historical plastics: Developing an in situ analytical protocol based on Raman microscopy

Angelin

Sá

Picollo

et al. 2020

J Raman Spectroscopy

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“…However, since PR49 has been identified as the source of decay of Mark Rothko's Harvard Murals, its fastness to light has been extensively investigated. Recent light-aging experiments showed that the neat powder is very lightfast but that the pigment has poor light stability within systems, mainly due to the interaction with the binding media [56,57].…”

Section: Azo Class β-Naphtholsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Analytical studies on commercial artists’ colour charts from Das Deutsche Farbenbuch (1925)—identification of synthetic and natural organic colourants by Raman microscopy, surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy and metal underlayer ATR-FTIR spectroscopy

et al. 2022

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Historical colour charts provide a rich and often well-dated reference materials source for studying the chemical composition of all kinds of commercial brands of artists’ paints. This article presents the results of an extensive analytical study of more than 80 paint hues from 11 colour charts that are included in the German standard book Das Deutsche Farbenbuch by H. Trillich (1925, Part II). Our research focused on the identification of synthetic organic pigments, whose quickly increasing significance for artists’ paints in the early twentieth century is impossible to evaluate by documentary source research alone. A stepwise procedure combining different non- or minimally invasive vibrational spectroscopy techniques—Normal Raman and Surface-Enhanced Raman spectroscopy as well as Metal Underlayer Attenuated Total Reflection Fourier-transform Infrared Spectroscopy—allowed the identification of 18 different organic colourants in artists’ watercolours, tempera and oil colours from six German manufacturers. In addition, micro-X-Ray Fluorescence spectroscopy was applied to determine the elemental pattern of substrates, fillers, and admixed inorganic pigments. In addition to a few traditional natural organic colourants (dark and rose madder lake, cochineal lake), most of the identified compounds comprised synthetic organic pigments or synthetic dyes from various chemical classes (indigo, anthraquinone, monoazo, ß-naphthol, xanthene, triarylcarbonium, nitroso, and azine compounds). Some of these have not or only rarely been reported in artists’ paints so far. Since the identified organic colourants have mainly poor to fair (only sometimes good) fastness to light according to modern standards and partially also to solvents typically used in conservation treatments, it is evident that works of art from this period should be treated keeping in mind the possible presence of such colourants, when planning both interventive treatments and preventive measures.

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“…The source requirements for illuminating a Rothko are very stringent. The materials used by Rothko (including the use of whole eggs as a binder [9]) have a propensity for fading as evidenced by his Harvard murals ( Figure 3) [2,9,10]. 'High responsivity' works of this kind need a visible spectrum lux limit of 50 lux with no UV content to minimize damage [11,12].…”

Section: Lighting a Rothkomentioning

confidence: 99%

Designing a Freeform Optic for Oblique Illumination

Ulanch¹,

Williams²,

King³

et al. 2017

Optical Design and Fabrication 2017 (Freeform, IODC, OFT)

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Abstract:The Functional Freeform Fitting (F 4 ) method is utilized to design a freeform optic for oblique illumination of Mark Rothko's Green on Blue (1956). Shown are preliminary results from an iterative freeform design process; from problem definition and specification development to surface fit, ray tracing results, and optimization. This method is applicable to both point and extended sources of various geometries.

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The making of Mark Rothko's Harvard Murals

Cited by 11 publications

References 6 publications

The identification of synthetic organic red pigments in historical plastics: Developing an in situ analytical protocol based on Raman microscopy

The identification of synthetic organic red pigments in historical plastics: Developing an in situ analytical protocol based on Raman microscopy

Analytical studies on commercial artists’ colour charts from Das Deutsche Farbenbuch (1925)—identification of synthetic and natural organic colourants by Raman microscopy, surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy and metal underlayer ATR-FTIR spectroscopy

Designing a Freeform Optic for Oblique Illumination

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