A frontal conference held by two speakers who, with the aid of audio-visual means, engage in a discussion on the works of the artist Mark Rothko and the contemporaries belonging to the artistic movement of Colour Field Painting.

The conference on May 8, 2026, is titled The Classic That Never Dies: Rothko Beyond Modernism  and is the first of a series of meetings scheduled for this year.

The speakers, Prof. Michele Tison and Dr. Prof. Renzo Barbazza, will continue the discussion between linguistic interpretation and the neuro-sensory-perceptual-aesthetic interpretation of works of art.

On this occasion, Prof. Tison will analyze the revolution of artists who, at the end of the 1940s, redefined abstraction through “Color Field Painting,” focusing in particular on the figure of Mark Rothko.

The talk will be introduced by a critical framework based on Renzo Barbazza’s Atlas of the History of Artists’ Works.

An innovative neuro-scientific perspective will be proposed, suggesting that chronologically distant works, such as those of Caravaggio and Rothko, can be connected if they activate the same nuclei of the Central Nervous System related to existential disturbance.

At the end of the conference, there will be ample time for questions and contributions from the audience.

Admission to the conference is free.