(Credit: Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen)
A child has damaged an original Mark Rothko painting, ‘Grey, Orange on Maroon, No. 8 (1960)’, in an art museum in Rotterdam.
The incident occurred at the Depot, which is a revolutionised art space allowing visitors to view thousands of works in a visible storage environment. Much of the collection is accessible without traditional exhibition barriers.
The Rothko work was displayed as part of Lievelingen, an exhibition featuring 70 collection highlights, from Bruegel to Dalí. The main museum is currently closed for renovations until at least 2030.
“The work by Rothko has suffered damage: a number of visible scratches in the unvarnished paint layer,” confirmed museum spokesperson Vincent Cardinaal. “It happened because a child, in an unsupervised moment, touched the lower part of the work. There was no intent. This was not vandalism.”
The child was less than five years old, and had waved a hand too close to the canvas. The Cardinaal remained positive in the wake of the incident. “We are currently researching the next steps for treatment and expect that the work will be able to be shown again in the future,” he stated.
A Rothko painting has been damaged in a public museum before. However, the previous incident was intentional; in 2012 a Polish man named Vladimir Umanets wrote on Black on Maroon (1958) at the Tate Modern in London. He used black ink to sign his name, adding the phrase “This is Yellowism.”
Umanets was sent to prison for two years. It took 18 months and about $250,000 to repair the painting. In the most recent case, it will not be revealed who will cover the repair cost: “We never disclose information regarding valuation, security, or insurance,” Cardinaal said. “That is standard policy — not just here, but across most major museums in Europe.”
One Eastern European art collector has estimated its value between $50 million and $60 million. Art crime expert Arthur Brand estimated that conservation work could cost between $50,000 to $150,000, but was quick to stress an understanding approach. “We should protect these works — absolutely — but we also need to let kids be around art. That’s how they fall in love with it,” he said.
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