This is the second exhibition in which I have crossed waters for (the first being the Vermeer Exhibition which occurred at the Rijksmuseum in Spring 2023), and it did not disappoint.

The exhibition started last year and I managed to go on the day it was closing (April 2nd), the exhibition was packed (whether that was because it was the last day or was just very popular I do not know.)

This was my first time visiting the Louis Vuitton Foundation building and I must say it was extremely impressive – the modern architectural structure was a work of art within itself. The location of it means you are walking through lovely greenery, and it seems like they are opening a circus/theme park/day out garden(?) right next door. Within the building, just after you leave the exhibition, is an explanation of the building and the architect’s models and plans for it, which was extremely interesting to see.

This exhibition will definitely get your steps up – the stairs are not for those easily out of breath (like me). They may have had a lift but the signposts for it were not made obvious. The exhibition was carried across multiple floors, I think maybe four floors.

I think an error of the exhibition was that outside every new floor had information about the stage of Rothko’s life that it was displaying – this meant that large crowds would be stood outside of the room blocking the entrance to the room, as well as the top of the staircase. As someone who doesn’t really read the information on the walls (I’m sorry) it was annoying to push through people to get into the room, I don’t dain to think what it would be like if you were physically unable to (would probably just have to stand around waiting).

The exhibition was in chronological order, with each room representing a new stage in Rothko’s life.

The exhibition started with his earliest works, with the colours reminding me of Hilma af Klint. They featured paintings of the every day, with an uncanny feeling. Rothko stated that he stopped painting people since he believed he was mutilating them, and I feel like this sentiment shows in his early works.

The exhibition guides you (as much as possible) through Rothko’s mindset regarding his early works, and the evolution of his fairly obviously human paintings to another worldly depiction of the human race, their faces distorted and their bodies growing several limbs.

It shows his movement away from the human figure and form and highlights his mentality when he starts to paint only shapes and geometric forms. The people he paints evolve with that in mind. Their bodies become shapes and not human.

The lighting throughout the whole exhibition was perfect – it was dim with the only bright(ish) lights shining on the paintings, It allowed me to be able to see everything in detail without having to squint due to bad lighting. The colours popped in this lighting as well.

The stage between his paintings of just squares is a weird one. With his paintings seemingly being more surrealist than anything, with Kandinsky coming to mind when I saw them.

The forms are erratic and I find them extremely compelling.

It is in the next room where the style Rothko is most known for starts to appear – the colourful shapes start to take form. It becomes immediately apparent how Rothko made the connections between the forms of the last room and what we now see before us.

Now that in the timeline of the exhibition Rothko has established his well-known style, the rest of the exhibition blended together for me.

All of the rooms contained the same style of painting, still continuing chronologically in his life (and up several staircases). However, eventually, we entered the later years of his life and this includes my favourite Rothko paintings, the Sea Gram Murals.

Oh how I had missed these paintings. Their home used to be at the Tate Britain, in a room which had an emotional aura, with it feeling like a holy space. However, obviously they went on tour and have been in this exhibition. I was very excited to be reunited with them.

Honestly, this exhibition did them much more justice compared to the Tate – the room was dimly lit, with the lights perfectly shining on each individual painting, showing its uniqueness.

It’s around the time of this room, and the sea gram murals, that you can see the mental determination of Rothko, with his square forms becoming much more straight-edged, and instead of having multiple forms, it starts to become just two.

His forms start to become much darker as we approach the last few years of his life and the exhibition guides you amazingly through this process.

It is in the last room where you see his final paintings. All of them feature very similar shades of black and grey. This room even included some sculptures, contrasting these paintings.

The last room was a beautiful memorial to Rothko in his last years. This room technically was not the last, although in my mind it was. Just after this there was a room, likely a filler room, but it was great nonetheless.

This room featured a model of the Harvard Chapel. This chapel is on my dream location list and it was so nice to see a model of it and how it is laid out – the pictures on the internet do not fully convey how the space is.

I am a sucker for a chronological, fairly traditional feeling exhibition, and so this ticks all of my boxes. I wish it was not its last day so I could go back again. The Louis Vuitton Foundation did an amazing job and I feel very lucky that I was able to see this almost perfect exhibition.