One of the most esteemed abstract expressionists and greatest painters of the 20th century and t and t and t and t and t and t Mark Rothko belongs to the generation of American artists who completely revolutionized the essence of abstract painting. His stylistic evolution, from a figurative visual repertoire to an abstract style rooted in the active relationship of the observer to the painting, embodied the radical vision of a renaissance in painting. Rothko characterized this relationship as and "a consummated experience between picture and onlooker and ". His colour formations indeed draw the observer into a space filled with an inner light. and t and t and t and tRothko always resisted attempts to interpret his paintings. He was mainly concerned with the viewer`s experience, the merging of work and recipient beyond verbal comprehension. Rothko was an intellectual, a thinker, a highly educated man. He loved music and literature and was very involved in philosophy, especially in the works of Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche and of ancient Greek philosophy and mythology. and t and t and t and tRothko was a protagonist within the movement of American painters who became known as the Abstract Expressionists. First formed in New York City during the inter-war years, this group was also called the New York School. In all the history of art, they became the first American artists to receive international recognition as a significant movement. Many among them, including Rothko, have become legendary figures. and t and t and t and t and t and t About the and t and tEach book in TASCHEN's Basic Art series