Museums are great learning institutions for children. They amalgamate the past, present, and inspire the future in the most tangible sense. Speaking of tangible, a child took that quite literally in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, and ended up damaging a precious Mark Rothko painting at the Boijmans Van Beuningen museum. How precious, you ask? The artwork titled Grey, Orange on Maroon, No. 8 (1960) has an estimated value of $56 million.
Rothko, an American master celebrated for his vast canvases with “floating areas of colour”, painted the work in 1960, and Boijmans acquired it in 1970; it is one of only two Rothkos in the Netherlands and among the museum’s most valuable treasures. Earlier this spring it featured in the depot’s “Lievelingen” exhibition, six gigantic works on view from 2 March to 6 April, when, during an unguarded moment, the child scratched the underside of the masterpiece, causing superficial damage.
According to the Dutch daily AD, conservation expertise has been sought in the Netherlands and abroad. We are currently researching the next steps for the treatment of the painting. We expect that the work will be able to be shown again in the future.” The scratches sit where the canvas folds around its stretcher, so conservators believe careful consolidation and in-painting can restore the surface.
The artwork, often described as a meditative colour landscape of hovering rectangles—has long held a special place in Dutch hearts. In 2021 it headlined the Stedelijk Museum Schiedam’s show Rothko and I, where visitors were allowed ten solitary minutes with the canvas; some left in tears. Contemporary artist Anselm Kiefer once said of Rothko’s late work, “Rothko’s paintings are not pictures. They are breathing spaces.” It seems that very breath of vivid orange against maroon lured the inquisitive hand that left the scratches.
The Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen has identified the child but has not yet publicly assigned responsibility for the repair costs. In the Netherlands, museums normally recover restoration expenses from the visitor who caused the damage via their insurance, and the identities of the child and parents are known. For now, specialists at home and abroad are mapping the pigment layers so that Grey, Orange on Maroon, No. 8 can once again inspire visitors—this time from a respectful distance.
