Rothko Chapel has always been a sacred sanctuary in Houston, a place for solitude, prayer and introspection. A vandal (or group of vandals) set out to destroy the stillness and quiet with an act of hatred.

At roughly 5:30 last Friday morning, security from the Menil Collection discovered splashes of white paint by Rothko Chapel’s entrance and by the reflecting pool around “The Broken Obelisk,” a beloved Barnett Newman sculpture dedicated to Martin Luther King Jr.

But that wasn’t all. Handbills were thrown across the ground, bearing the message: “It’s okay to be white.” The Rothko Chapel community is reeling.

“It’s not just the physical damage but it’s also the emotional damage because something like this is clearly intended to have racial overtones. That kind of racism is an incident of hate,” Rothko Chapel executive director David Leslie tells PaperCity.

The handbills were turned in, and Rothko Chapel filed a report with the Houston Police Department. The investigation is ongoing.

There was no permanent damage, and the contractors of the reflection pool were able to vacuum out the paint without draining the pool. Rothko Chapel was forced to temporarily close on Friday, but Leslie was determined to reopen that afternoon. PC Picks

“Really, the most critical thing was to be back open and accessible to the public. That was the strongest way we could respond to this act of vandalism,” Leslie says.

Rothko Chapel set up several tables outside the building so that the chapel’s staff could explain the incident to visitors. As best they could explain a cruel, needless vandalism. A Target for Hate?

Leslie believes the chapel’s mission as a space of worship and inclusivity made it a target for this kind of vandalism. “We don’t know who the people or person is that did the damage — but they had a message,” he says.

“I think that the Rothko Chapel, because of what it stands for, is a sense of community, equity and a welcome to all people… there’s a little bit of concern that a place that has those kind of values is a target for those who don’t hold those values. Exactly what the Rothko Chapel stands for, open dialogue, open conversation, safety, security — we say the antithesis of that.”

Any institution that engages with the public on those terms, whether it be an art museum, a cultural institution, a religious community or school faces a heightened level of vulnerability at the moment, Leslie adds.

He placed the incident at the chapel in a broader societal scope. “Remember, this was also when the shooting in Santa Fe High School (happened). We’ve seen things that are a lot worse. That doesn’t diminish what happened here but puts it into context,” Leslie notes. “It could have been a lot worse. We were cognizant of the pain and suffering happening in other places.”

Rothko Chapel is currently developing a precautionary plan and increasing security. “We’ve definitely stepped up the nightly, off-hours patrol,” Leslie says. “It’s something that you hope never will happen but have to prepare for.” He’s fearful for more than the building.

“It brings up questions about the safety of your staff, your colleagues. The safety of visitors,” he says.

This is not the first time the Rothko has been vandalized. Leslie describes some of it as fairly innocuous and some more targeted, like anti-Semitic symbols drawn on the obelisk decades ago.

It’s a sad situation for the remarkable site of modern art, but that’s all part of modern times.

“It becomes very unsettling,” Leslie says. “This makes you wonder where it comes from, what sector of society? It is an individual complaint that somebody has, or is it part of a larger movement?”