Rothko's Rooms

A sweeping retrospective of the work of Mark Rothko heads to the Foundation Louis Vuitton.

- CHLOE SCHAMA

In the late summer of 2021, Christopher Rothko—son of Mark Rothko, the celebrated New York School painter—found himself driving up and down the coast of California. The psychologist turned guardian (along with his sister, Kate Rothko Prizel) of his father’s legacy had been working to bring together many of his lesser-seen paintings for a large-scale exhibition. Emails had been sent; requests had been registered. But for some of those appeals, there had been little traction—until Rothko paid a visit. “People were so hungry for direct contact. Eleven paintings that had been nominally deemed a possibility were promised to the exhibition at the end of my trip,” he says.