OBSERVER: Red
Directed by Iain Sinclair, John Logan’s Red crafts a compelling narrative based on a true event. In 1958, the artist Mark Rothko, played by Dylan Smith, was commissioned to paint murals for the famed New York eatery, the Four Seasons.
On his first day as Rothko’s new assistant, played by Jordan Briggs, is instructed to observe Rothko’s latest works: “What do you see?” he says.
“Be kind, these pictures deserve compassion.”
Despite protests that he is only an employee, Rothko mentors him, who, in turn, acts as a sounding board for Rothko’s anxiety, jealousies and bitterness.
As teacher, Rothko pontificates on the meaning of art and the poetic expression of tragedy. However, his relationship with his assistant serves as a metaphor for the old guard needing to give way to the new, from modernists like Rothko to the pop-art postmodernists—the Warhols, Lichtensteins and Rauschenbergs he rails against.
In addition to mixing paints, stretching canvases, buying coffee and listening to Rothko’s furious condemnation of his contemporaries and the art establishment, his assistant begins to find his own voice as an artist.
While Briggs brings an endearing and earnest appeal to the much-put-upon apprentice, Smith is mesmerising as Rothko, the tortured artist battling the world and his inner demons.
“Ten per cent of one’s time,” says Rothko, “is putting paint on canvas – the rest is waiting.” And thinking deeply about art and his legacy.
The tragic irony at the heart of the play is that Rothko is well aware that he is compromising his own principles by creating murals for a fancy restaurant.
Accepting this realisation, Rothko gives his assistant a final directive, “Make something new!” echoing Ezra Pound’s 1934 modernist imperative, “Make it new.”
The old guard finally recognising its role and that of the next generation.
Review by Kathryn Keeble