Review: The new Rothko exhibit in Paris is spellbinding washingtonpost.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from washingtonpost.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Walking through the lawn that separates the Menil Collection and its park to the east from the Rothko Chapel in Houston’s Montrose neighborhood, I am not particularly struck by the type of transcendent beauty for which I am told to prepare myself. There is a group doing yoga on the lawn, everyone spaced 6 feet apart on colorful mats. People read books and lower their masks to chat. A docent wanders around the main attraction, between the Chapel’s entrance and Barnett Newman’s “Broken Obelisk” sculpture outside. It’s all fairly serene and pleasant. But the building itself, one of the most important artworks in the country, isn’t remarkable to me at first; from the exterior it looks not unlike an elementary school gymnasium. Until I walk inside.