MARK ROTHKO'S paintings lead you into calm thought, into an atmosphere of color, that dissolves any word attempting to describe it. From surrcalistic forms his images evolved into monumental rectangles that hover on the canvas. His color is subtle and strange. Part of the Abstract Expressionist movement, his work differed radically in tone and form from the others, like Jackson Pollock and William de Kooning. The simplicity of his rectangles foresaw the purity but not the hardness of the images of minimal art.

In taking ideas from Rothko, the minimal artist never came near his unique vision. Yet often in the racing movement of the avant-garde an artist may feel that his statements become irrelevant, once someone has said something newer.

Rothko believed that a painting breathes in the understanding of those who see it. His works do not live easily in our eye. Like all complex, contemporary art, they question us, confuse us with shape, dazzle us with size.

His death this week will make us see his canvasses differently. We will see the movement of intense shades of red without the assumption that these works can be produced indefinitely. Rothko's final despair, leading to his suicide Wednesday, tragically reminds us of a vision we have lost.