Mark Rothko, "The Syrian Bull" (1943), Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin
“We do not intend to defend our pictures. They make their own defense. We consider them clear statements. Your failure to dismiss or disparage them is prima facie evidence that they carry some communicative power.” In a letter published in The New York Times in 1943, artists Mark Rothko and Adolph Gottlieb put forth their first thoughts about this thing they were helping to create — abstract-expressionism. In this important piece they cited two of their own creations: Rothko’s Syrian Bull and Gottlieb’s The Rape of Persephone – and to my surprise I saw both of them today.
These paintings are part of the permanent collection at the Allen Memorial Art Museum in Oberlin, Ohio. Though their subject matter has a bookish, mythological source their presentation is both primitive and surreal. When they were first shown in New York, Times art critic Edward Alden Jewell wrote: “You will have to make of Marcus Rothko’s ‘The Syrian Bull’ what you can; nor is this department prepared to shed the slightest enlightenment when it comes to Adolph Gottlieb’s ‘Rape of Persephone’.” To this critique they wrote their now-famous letter. It is because of this letter and the principles it laid out that these paintings are so important. Historical importance aside, when I stood in front of The Syrian Bull it spoke to something more personal, simple and fundamental — it reminded me of what great art can really do. It can make you feel human.
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