29-Name That Color

Color is never an innocent or passive entity in our world, but an important actor in its own right. Humans have used color throughout millennia for Art, Industry, and Institutions. Unusual stories of 75 fascinating shades, dyes, and hues that run like a bright thread throughout history. From the charcoal on the cave walls at Lascaux to blonde or ginger, meet the brown that changed the way battles were fought and unique mummy brown, to the white that protected against the plague. From acid yellow to Kelly green, scarlet women to imperial purple, from Van Gogh’s chrome yellow sunflowers (and did they poison him?) to Picasso’s blue period or punk’s fluorescent pink. Enter a unique study of human civilization, across fashion, politics, art, and war, the secret lives of color tell the vivid story of our culture and how artists have used color to express essential ideas and needs.