Editing Mark Rothko (section)

===Break with Surrealism===
[[File:Baptismal Scene, 1945, Mark Rothko at NGA 2023.jpg|thumb|right|''Baptismal Scene'' (1945) at the [[National Gallery of Art]] in 2023. This was Rothko's first painting to enter a museum collection, acquired by the [[Whitney Museum]] in 1946]]

On June 13, 1943, Rothko and Sachar separated again.{{sfn|Breslin|1993|p=170}} Rothko suffered depression following their divorce.<ref>Grange, p. 66</ref> Thinking that a change of scenery might help, Rothko returned to Portland. From there, he traveled to Berkeley, where he met artist [[Clyfford Still]], and the two began a close friendship.{{sfn|Breslin|1993|p=205}}{{sfn|Ashton|1983|p=92–93}} Still's deeply abstract paintings would be of considerable influence on Rothko's later works. In the autumn of 1943, Rothko returned to New York. He met with noted collector and art dealer [[Peggy Guggenheim]], but she was initially reluctant to take on his artworks.{{sfn|Breslin|1993|p=208}} Rothko's one-person show at Guggenheim's the [[Art of This Century gallery]], in late 1945, resulted in few sales, with prices ranging from $150 to $750. The exhibit also attracted less-than-favorable reviews from critics. During this period, Rothko had been stimulated by Still's abstract landscapes of color, and his style shifted away from surrealism. Rothko's experiments in interpreting the unconscious symbolism of everyday forms had run their course. His future lay with abstraction:

{{blockquote|I insist upon the equal existence of the world engendered in the mind and the world engendered by God outside of it. If I have faltered in the use of familiar objects, it is because I refuse to mutilate their appearance for the sake of an action which they are too old to serve, or for which perhaps they had never been intended. I quarrel with surrealists and abstract art only as one quarrels with his father and mother; recognizing the inevitability and function of my roots, but insistent upon my dissent; I, being both they and an integral completely independent of them.<ref>Baal-Teshun, p. 39.</ref>}}

Rothko's masterpiece ''Slow Swirl at the Edge of the Sea'' (1945) illustrates his newfound propensity towards abstraction. It has been interpreted as a meditation on Rothko's courtship of his second wife, Mary Alice "Mell" Beistle, whom he met in 1944 and married in early 1945. Other readings have noted echoes of Botticelli's ''The Birth of Venus'', which Rothko saw at an "Italian Masters" loan exhibition, at the Museum of Modern Art, in 1940. The painting presents, in subtle grays and browns, two human-like forms embraced in a swirling, floating atmosphere of shapes and colors. The rigid rectangular background foreshadows Rothko's later experiments in pure color. The painting was completed, not coincidentally, in the year the Second World War ended.{{sfn|Breslin|1993|p=212–42}}

[[File:Sacrifice, 1946, Mark Rothko at NGA.jpg|thumb|right|''Sacrifice'' (1946) at the [[National Gallery of Art]] in 2023]]

Although initially hesitant to purchase his works, Guggenheim did acquire several works following Rothko's exhibition at the Art of This Century gallery, including ''Sacrifice'' (1946), which she purchased immediately following its completion.<ref name="Sacrifice NGA label">{{Cite sign |title=Sacrifice |year=2023 |type=Museum label |publisher=[[National Gallery of Art]] |location=[[Washington, D.C.]] |series=Mark Rothko: Paintings on Paper |quote=Peggy Guggenheim, an influential art dealer and collector, acquired this work shortly after Rothko completed it. Guggenheim had organized an exhibition of the artist's paintings on paper and canvas at her Art of This Century gallery in New York City in early 1945. Sacrifice was later shown in several European exhibitions of Guggenheim's collection during Rothko's lifetime, making it one of the first works by Rothko to be displayed outside the United States.}}</ref> Like other works of this period, it depicted biomorphic shapes and abstract imagery in subtle tones.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Flint |first1=Lucy |title=Sacrifice |url=https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/3531 |website=Guggenheim |publisher=[[Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation]] |access-date=26 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231126015420/https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/3531 |archive-date=26 November 2023 |url-status=live}}</ref> Guggenheim later showed this work in her European galleries, making it among the first of Rothko's paintings to be exhibited outside the United States.<ref name="Sacrifice NGA label" />

Despite the abandonment of his "Mythomorphic Abstractionism", Rothko would still be recognized by the public primarily for his surrealist works, for the remainder of the 1940s. The [[Whitney Museum]] included them in their annual exhibit of contemporary art from 1943 to 1950.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Selz |first=Peter |url=https://assets.moma.org/documents/moma_catalogue_2557_300062218.pdf |title=Mark Rothko |publisher=Museum of Modern Art, New York |year=1961 |pages=7}}</ref> ''Baptismal Scene'' (1945), included in the shows at the Whitney, was acquired by the museum in 1946; this was the first work of Rothko's to enter a museum collection, marking a key career milestone. ''Baptismal Scene'' depicts an abstracted baptism in watercolors against a dusky grayish brown background, with an identifiable baptismal fountain at the top of the painting.<ref name="Baptismal Scene NGA label">{{Cite sign |title=Baptismal Scene |year=2023 |type=Museum label |publisher=[[National Gallery of Art]] |location=[[Washington, D.C.]] |series=Mark Rothko: Paintings on Paper |quote=In early 1946 the Whitney Museum of American Art acquired ''Baptismal Scene'', making it the first work by Rothko to enter a museum collection. This seems fitting since baptism is a rite of initiation in the Christian faith. As a purification ritual performed by full or partial immersion in water, its treatment in watercolor also feels apt. Note the blue fountain at the top of Rothko's composition.}}</ref>