Colour : Art and Science

Rating:
Summary: A very good introduction
Review: 'Colour, like beauty, is in the eye and brain of the beholder'. So Dennis Baylor writes in his explanation of how science understands the colour mechanisms in the eye. Like all the contributors, he talks about colour from a certain perspective, providing enough depth to interest someone with little prior knowledge without losing the reader along the way. The approaches to colour roughly fall into three different categories: scientific perspectives looking at the physics and biology of light and colour; a discussion of culture, language and colour; and an overview of colour in art. The two chapters on this last subject were fascinating for me. The history of colour in art talked about the importance of pigments in medieval art, and how the use of colour in painting was affected by the subsequent introduction of oil and synthetic paints. Colour for the painter covered artists like Titian, Caravaggio, Vermeer, Velazquez, Monet and Matisse. My only problem was that I became so interested in their discussions that I wanted them to cover more.