Red : The History of a Color.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Pastoureau, Michel, 1947-

Series:

The History of a Color Series

Standardized Title:

Rouge. English

Language:

English

French

Subjects (All):

Red in art.

Symbolism of colors--History.

Color--Social aspects--History.

Color--Psychological aspects--History.

Red.

Symbolism of colors.

Color--Social aspects.

Color--Psychological aspects.

Color.

Genre:

Ouvrages illustres.

Illustrated works.

History.

illustrated books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (288 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Princeton : Princeton University Press, 2017.

Language Note:

Translated from the French.

Summary:

"The color red has represented many things, from the life force and the divine to love, lust, and anger. Up through the Middle Ages, red held a place of privilege in the Western world. For many cultures, red was not just one color of many but rather the only color worthy enough to be used for social purposes--in some languages, the word for red was the same as the word for color. The first color developed for painting and dying, red became associated in antiquity with war, wealth, and power. In the medieval period, red held both religious significance, as the color of the blood of Christ and the fires of Hell, and secular meaning, as a symbol of love, glory, and beauty. Yet during the Protestant Reformation, red began to decline in status. Viewed as indecent and immoral and linked to luxury and the excesses of the Catholic Church, red fell out of favor. After the French Revolution, red gained new respect as the color of progressive movements and radical left-wing politics. In this beautifully illustrated book, Michel Pastoureau, the acclaimed author of Blue, Black, and Green, now masterfully navigates centuries of symbolism and complex meanings to present the fascinating and sometimes controversial history of the color red. Pastoureau illuminates red's evolution through a diverse selection of captivating images, from the cave paintings of Lascaux, the works of Renaissance masters, to modern paintings and stained glass by Mark Rothko and Josef Albers"--Inside front jacket flap.

Contents:

The first color : from earliest times to the end of antiquity: The first palettes

Fire and blood

With Pliny among the painters

Dyeing in red

Roman purple

Red in everyday life

Evidence from the lexicon

The favorite color : sixth to fourteenth centuries: The four reds of the church fathers

The blood of Christ

The red of power

The first color of heraldry

Love, glory, and beauty

Blue versus red

The wardrobes of beautiful Florentine ladies

A controversial color : fourteenth to seventeenth centuries: In the flames of Hell

Judas, the redhead

Hatred of red

The red of painters

A primary color

Fabric and clothing

Little red riding hood

A dangerous color? : eighteenth to twenty-first centuries: On the margins of red : pink

Makeup and society life

Red caps and flags : in the midst of the revolution

A political color

Emblems and signals

Red for the present day.

Notes:

Illustrated endpapers.

Originally published: Paris : Éditions du Seuil, 2016, under the title: Rouge: Histoire d'une couleur.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Other Format:

Print version: Pastoureau, Michel Red

ISBN:

9780691251370 (ebook)

9780691172774 (hbk.)

9780691251370

0691251371

OCLC:

1382385837