A Mark Rothko painting that was vandalized in October 2012 has gone back on display at Tate Modern today, May 13, following 18 months of conservation.
Black on Maroon (1958) was attacked by Wlodzimierz Umaniec, who called himself “Vladimir Umanets.”
He had scrawled “VLADIMIR UMANETS ’12 A POTENTIAL PIECE OF YELLOWISM” in thick black graffiti ink, on the lower right hand corner of the painting.
The ink had so deeply penetrated the work that, in many areas, it had soaked right through to the back of the canvas.
Tate director Nicholas Serota spoke about the attack at a press conference this morning: “to be in a position where you are responsible for these works, and to then hear that something has happened – it is devastating.
“It was a really ghastly feeling.”
When news of the vandalism broke, conservators were called to the painting within the hour to assess the extent of the damage.
“I was nervous, but it is my job,” Tate’s paintings conservator Rachel Barker said. “I had a job to do, so I got on with it.”
Serota added: “right at the outset I said [to the conservation team], ‘you have as long as it takes.’”
Now, after a year and a half of intense restoration work, the masterpiece has been returned to a near-normal state.
Barker said that removing the thick ink from Rothko’s paint layers, which she described as “notoriously sensitive,” required a special chemical mix of benzyl alcohol and ethyl lactate, and had to be removed using a more delicate tissue than usual.
The attack put Tate’s security under the spotlight internationally, and has forced the gallery to review its systems for protecting artworks.
“Of course we have reviewed security, and I’m not going to tell you what it is,” Serota said.
However, he did say that the changes would be as seamless as possible.
“It is important for us not to turn into Fort Knox,” he said. “We are an art gallery.”
Umaniec was jailed for two years following the attack.
He stated at the time that he defaced the artwork in order to promote his own movement, “yellowism.”
At Umaniec’s sentencing, Judge Roger Chapple said it was “wholly and utterly unacceptable to promote [the yellowism movement] by damaging a work of art,” which he described as “a gift to the nation.”
Rothko had personally donated the work to the Tate in 1970, as part of his iconic series of Seagram murals.
