This gorgeous coffee table book celebrates over 2500 pigments of color
that will be visual candy on any countertop in your home. -E News
The Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies at the Harvard
Art Museums encompasses over 2,500 of the world's rarest pigments.
Museum director Edward Forbes started the collection at the turn of the
20th century, in order to preserve the early Italian paintings he had
begun to collect. Over the years, the collection grew into a huge
apothecary of bottles and beakers, as other art lovers and color experts
donated their own pigments. Today the collection continues to grow, and
regularly helps experts across the world to research and authenticate
paintings.
Visually excavating the museums' extraordinary collection, An Atlas of
Rare & Familiar Colour examines the contained pigments and
artefacts--their provenance, composition, symbology and application. It
also explores the larger related fields of chromatics, the historical
narratives of art and chemistry, and the innovations with which we have
sought to better illustrate our aesthetic and expressive compulsions.
The book includes a foreword by renowned British color author Victoria
Finlay.
"An encyclopedic photobook of poised still lifes, where each phial, herb
and pigment-filled container becomes a character, narrating the
fascinating history of color." -Wallpaper
