The image of an artist lying supine on a studio floor was first implanted in my mind by art critic Robert Hughes. In my teens I stumbled across his essay on Rothko, “Blue Chip Sublime”. In it, Hughes describes the state of Rothko's body when it was found in his New York studio - “He lay, fat and exsanguinated, clad in long underwear and black socks, in the middle of a lake of blood.” .