LIGHTING: AN EVOLUTION

American painter Mark Rothko took immense satisfaction in the distinction between night and day. His innate love of contrasts is clear in his art, but also in his vision of the Rothko Chapel, located in Houston, Texas. In today’s pandemic-driven era, we can relate to Rothko’s positivity, and his tireless insistence that where there is darkness, there will always be light.

- ESRA LEMMENS

Rothko’s work has moved between dark and light and connects deeply with our observations and understanding of spirituality and the journeys that we experience. Or perhaps his art of seeing is so profound that to thoroughly understand his vision, we require a sensory form of intelligence. Human-centric lighting and environmental lighting are two of today's most significant movements. Lighting designers are embracing environmental change and listening to the needs of nature – and the nurture needed to move into a brighter future.

Evolved resolve

The lighting at the Rothko Chapel was never quite right; Rothko felt that it was poles apart from the light coming through the dirty windowpanes of his beloved New York studio. The Houston light was much stronger and brighter. Architecture Research Office (ARO)’s restoration changed the entire lighting experience, beginning outside with darkened pave stones at the entrance of the plaza, which reduced any glare and prepared the eye for the innermost sanctum of the space. The chapel's lighting design by George Sexton Associates includes the installation of a new skylight that bathes 14 of the painter’s black but slightly colourhued canvases in an ephermeral glow, using special glass and clever louvres that soften the intensity of the Texan sunlight. George Sexton Associates set digital lighting projectors into a nook around the skylight that bounce-focuses light onto the paintings with the use of intelligently placed mirrors. The placement alteration of the triptych avoids unnecessary shadows across the paintings, mimicking the lighting in Rothko's studio.