Thursday, March 19, 2026
6:30 PM

Concert: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's 270th Birthday Celebration
"Rothko and Mozart: The Balance of Emotion and Form"
Featuring violinist Olivia De Prato on Mozart’s original violin, built by Pietro Antonio dalla Costa in 1764, and pianist Mia Elezovic
Presented in partnership with Austrian Cultural Forum New York & International Mozarteum Foundation
Pay What You Can $0-25, general admission chair seating
Registration forthcoming end of January 2026

In honor of the 270th anniversary of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s birth, the Rothko Chapel will host a special recital inspired by the composer whose music Mark Rothko himself often preferred while working in his studio. Presented in collaboration with the International Mozarteum Foundation in Salzburg, this intimate concert will feature a violin once played by Mozart himself, offering audiences a rare and historic experience.

Mark Rothko had a profound, almost spiritual relationship with music, often listening to classical masters while he painted. Rothko often cited Mozart as an ideal of artistic balance between structure and emotion — a creator who could express the deepest human emotion within the strictest formal clarity. He admired how Mozart could be tragic without sentimentality, spiritual without dogma. That duality resonated deeply with Rothko’s own aims in painting.

The performance follows the opening of a major Mozart exhibition at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York on March 13, 2026, and is made possible with the support of the Austrian Cultural Forum New York and the International Mozarteum Foundation, who will provide the artists and instrument for this extraordinary occasion.