The Harvard Art Museums' Forbes Pigment Collection
Foreword by Victoria Finlay. Introduction by Narayan Khandekar. Text by Kingston Trinder. Contributions by Pascale Georgiev.
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
Featured image, "Byaku Gunjo (189 grs), Straus. 1800, is reproduced from 'An Atlas of Rare & Familiar Colour.'
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
AnOther
[An Atlas of Rare & Familiar Colour] delves into the symbolism of colours to better explain humanity’s aesthetic and expressive compulsions.
Hyperallergic
Renée Reizman
This book highlights pieces from the collection of rare pigments preserved...While popular in their day, some pigments could never pass FDA regulations in the present; bright yellows contained monkey urine, and rich greens used for textile dyes pulled their color from poisonous arsenic.
FORMAT: Hbk, 7 x 9.25 in. / 224 pgs / 180 color / 9 duotone / 8 b&w. LIST PRICE: U.S. $50.00 LIST PRICE: CANADA $69.95 GBP £45.00 ISBN: 9780997593570 PUBLISHER: Atelier Éditions AVAILABLE: 1/16/2018 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Out of print AVAILABILITY: Not available TERRITORY: WORLD
An Atlas of Rare & Familiar Colour The Harvard Art Museums' Forbes Pigment Collection
Published by Atelier Éditions. Foreword by Victoria Finlay. Introduction by Narayan Khandekar. Text by Kingston Trinder. Contributions by Pascale Georgiev.
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
