ARTalk: Changing Palettes

Color, a function of light, is so fundamental to visual experience that we often forget we're seeing it. Artists however-such as those exhibited in Colors in Art: Voices Soft and Loud-remind us to notice, appreciate, and celebrate color by foregrounding color and color relationships in visually stunning, cognitively challenging, and emotionally rewarding artworks.

In this talk, we will begin with a brief exploration of colored pigments in the pre-modern period. We then turn our attention to key developments in the modern period, notably investigations in fields of chemistry and optics, which led key modernist artists, including Claude Monet, Henri Matisse, and Wassily Kandinsky to deploy color in new and innovative ways.

With the legacy of these modernist innovators in mind, we can look at the artworks on exhibit with fresh eyes, appreciating contemporary artists' ongoing, varied, and meaningful explorations of color.

Kevin Muller is a specialist in the history of American art. He received his Ph.D. from the History of Art Department at the University of California, Berkeley. He is the full-time art historian at the College of Marin, and a frequent lecturer at Bay Area museums, including the DeYoung, Legion, and Crocker museums.