ROThko Red

For this post, I first thought about the word red, and how it's kind of a funny little word, and so I went to look up the etymology.  Red is Germanic in origin, going back to the word rot for red in Old German.  Yes, our classmate has the last name Rotbart which translates into Redbeard.  I think Air Force regs are keeping him from his ancestry.

So then I was thinking about rot and red and then I thought about Mark Rothko, the abstract expressionist painter who has created some works of simplistic beauty that I quite like.  Although his paintings feature many colors, I like the ones with red the most - and you can't spell Rothko without rot after all.

This lead me to attempt an MS Paint version of a Rothko.  No easel, no paint, no brushes, no mess.  Just a man and his mouse.  The cool thing about the MS Paint versions of today are that they have a variety of brush tools.  The one I selected for this venture even runs out of paint after a couple of swipes, just like a real brush would, which allows you to give the picture some texture.  It's not Rothko, but it is my homage to him on this daily creativity challenge.

A last thought on how this idea might have popped into my mind is that about a half hour before I began this little journey my wife excitedly reminded me that this Sunday marks the premiere of the last season of Mad Men, one of my favorite shows, which depicts life at a Madison Avenue ad agency throughout the 1960s.  One of my favorite scenes was where some of the execs sneak into the boss's office to check out his Rothko painting.  They marvel at it, and wonder if the old man is losing it or if it is some kind of joke.  You can watch the clip HERE.  I recommend checking it out until the 1:21 mark, which is the end of my favorite scene.  There is an additional related scene which immediately follows, which is also entertaining.

Red + rot + Mad Men = Rothko attempt.