Scope and Contents The Rothko Chapel Renewal and Campus Expansion (Phase One) HoustonThe Rothko Chapel is 50 years old this February, and it has never looked better, thanks to a studious update by Architecture Research Office. For those unfamiliar with the project, it is an essential part of one of the great high-low culture visitor experiences in Houston: an afternoon wandering the Lancaster Place subdivision, with its dreamlike collection of bungalows (all painted grey, with white trim), taking...

Scope and Contents Hearing VoicesAs a librettist, I thought the idea of setting an opera in the Rothko Chapel seemed preposterous. The much hallowed place in Houston, considered by many to be one of the greatest achievements in mid-twentieth-century art, doubles as a gallery exhibiting Mark Rothko's paintings and as a sanctuary of quiet and contemplation. It is where the merest whisper can incur the most censorious sneers from fellow visitors. Setting an opera in the chapel seemed almost...