The National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC has announced that an exhibition of 27 works by Mark Rothko drawn from its collection will travel to China and South Korea this year in a tour organised by the US State Department. The show is the first survey of Rothko’s work to be presented in either country. The exhibition is an expanded version of a show which travelled to the State Museum of Art in Riga, Latvia, and the Hermitage in St Petersburg in 2003 to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the artist’s birth. It is currently on view at the Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City (until 8 January) and includes drawings, paintings, watercolours and gouaches dating from the 1920s through to the 1970s. It travels to the Hong Kong Museum of Art (31 March-4 June) and the Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul (22 June-10 September). The National Gallery of Art has the world’s largest collection of work by Rothko; the institution received 296 paintings, and more than 600 drawings and watercolours from the Rothko Foundation after the artist’s death in 1970. Earl A. Powell II, director of the National Gallery, said: “We consider it our responsibility to the international community to share the collection as widely as possible.”
Originally appeared in The Art Newspaper as 'Rothkos for China and South Korea'