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| Hendrik van Balen and Jan Brueghel the Elder Venus and Cupid ca. 1600 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Hendrik van Balen and Jan Brueghel the Younger Allegory of the virtuous life ca. 1625-26 oil on panel Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
The recipe of a work of art – its ingredients – how to make it – the formula.
1. There must be a clear preoccupation with death – intimations of mortality. . . . Tragic art, romantic art, etc., deals with the knowledge of death.
2. Sensuality. Our basis of being concrete about the world. It is a lustful relationship to things that exist.
3. Tension. Either conflict or curbed desire.
4. Irony. This is a modern ingredient – the self-effacement and examination by which a man for an instant can go on to something else.
5. Wit and play . . . for the human element.
6. The ephemeral and chance . . . for the human element.
7. Hope. 10% to make the tragic concept more endurable.
I measure these ingredients very carefully when I paint a picture. It is always the form that follows these elements and the picture results from the proportions of these elements.
– from a 1958 Address to the Pratt Institute, reprinted in Writings on Art by Mark Rothko, edited by Miguel López-Remiro (Yale, 2006)
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| Frans Pourbus the Younger Margaret of Savoy, Duchess of Mantua 1608 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Joost Momper II and Hans Jordaens III Monks in a grotto 1620s oil on panel, transferred to canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Jacob Jordaens Allegorical family portrait ca. 1650-55 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Jacob Jordaens Portrait of an old man ca. 1637 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Paul Bril Sea harbor ca. 1610-15 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Jan Siberechts Shepherdess 1666 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Jan Erasmus Quellinus Allegory of Fertility 1697 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Michele Desubleo Jael 1640s oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Frans Francken the Younger Allegory of Chance 1627 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Michiel Sweerts Portrait of a man (possible self-portrait) 1656 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Peter Paul Rubens Portrait of Charles de Longueval 1621 oil on panel Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Peter Paul Rubens Landscape with Dam ca. 1635 gouache Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |