Color Scheme: An Irreverent History of Art and Pop Culture in Color Palettes

Length: 144 pages
Edition: 1
Language: English
Publisher: Princeton Architectural Press
Publication Date: 2021-11-02
ISBN-10: 1616899921
ISBN-13: 9781616899929
Sales Rank: #21881 (See Top 100 Books)

Change the way you see color forever in this dazzling collection of color palettes spanning art history and pop culture, and told in writer and artist Edith Young’s accessible, inviting style.

From the shades of pink in the blush of Madame de Pompadour’s cheeks to Prince’s concert costumes, Color Scheme decodes the often overlooked color concepts that can be found in art history and visual culture. Edith Young’s forty color palettes and accompanying essays reveal the systems of color that underpin everything we see, allowing original and, at times, even humorous themes to emerge. Color Scheme is the perfect book for anyone interested in learning more about, or rethinking, how we see the world around us.

Cover
Title
Dedication
Contents
Foreword, Zachary Fine
Introduction
    The reds of the red caps in Renaissance portraits, 1460–1535
The Artist’s Palette
    The blush of Madame de Pompadour’s cheeks, 1746–63
Art History
    The Art History Detective
        The dresses worn by Velázquez’s infantas
        Frans Hals’s ruff collars
    Palettes
        The pupils of the eyes in Vermeer’s portraits, 1656–72
        Caravaggio’s Boy with a Basket of Fruit, 1593
        The yellow bills in John James Audubon’s The Birds of America, 1827–38
        The blue bills in John James Audubon’s The Birds of America, 1827–38
        The roseate bills in John James Audubon’s The Birds of America, 1827–38
        The blush of Marie Antoinette’s cheeks
        Thanksgiving in America, 1825–2009
        Seascapes, arranged along one horizon line
        The mountaintops of the diorama paintings in the American Museum of Natural History
        Helen Frankenthaler’s orange color fields
        Charles Burchfield’s violets and violas
        The stripes in Alice Neel’s portraits
        The flesh tones of Lucian Freud’s ex-wives
        Fairfield Porter’s skies
Contemporary Art
    The Typologists
    Palettes
        The artist’s palette, from Anguissola to Botero
        The blues of David Hockney’s pools
        Botero’s beverages
        The paint on Kerry James Marshall’s smocks
        The greens of the garnishes in Wayne Thiebaud’s still lifes
        Etel Adnan’s suns
        John Currin’s blondes
        The letter “E” in Mel Bochner’s paintings
Pop Culture
    The Color Strategy
    Palettes
        Tonya Harding’s figure skating costumes per competition
        Prince’s concert outfits
        Paul Thomas Anderson’s oeuvre
        Craig Sager’s suits, in chronological order over the course of his sportscasting career
        Walt Frazier’s suits, in chronological order over the course of his sportscasting career
        Dennis Rodman’s hair dye, in chronological order over the course of his NBA career
        Title cards from the second season of Saturday Night Live, 1976–77
        How Pete Davidson dresses from the waist up on Weekend Update
        Spike Lee’s eyeglasses, 1989–2020
CMYK Values
Acknowledgments
Copyright