Uploaded August 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Executed in 1969, the penultimate year of Rothko's life, Untitled reaches nearly 80 inches — rivaling the scale of his major canvases — and radiates a phosphorescent violet glow through registers of velvety black, evoking the meditative depth of his Rothko Chapel commission in Houston.
Rothko turned to paper as his primary medium after falling ill in 1968, when doctors advised him against handling large, heavy canvases. As scholar Adam Greenhalgh observed, the largest of these late works on paper are "on par with the dimensions of any of his abstract canvases made after 1949" — proof that in his final years, paper had become Rothko's preferred support, not a lesser one.
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Executed in 1969, the penultimate year of Rothko's life, Untitled reaches nearly 80 inches — rivaling the scale of his major canvases — and radiates a phosphorescent violet glow through registers of velvety black, evoking the meditative depth of his Rothko Chapel commission in Houston.
Rothko turned to paper as his primary medium after falling ill in 1968, when doctors advised him against handling large, heavy canvases. As scholar Adam Greenhalgh observed, the largest of these late works on paper are "on par with the dimensions of any of his abstract canvases made after 1949" — proof that in his final years, paper had become Rothko's preferred support, not a lesser one.
Still haven’t subscribed to Sotheby’s on YouTube? ►►youtube.com/sothebys
