Color in Art

[Heather]

These are just a few suggestions; Remember, if you choose to read a book in this category (and it can be any book about color, not a coloring book! :) ) please put your name and the name of the book under 'comment'. You may even let us know your progress and what you are learning. When you finish the book, we look forward to your review!

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19...

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10...

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11...

[Stacie]

Stacie's (Jan+)Feb read Color: A Natural History of the Palette

[Heather]

Good choice, Stacie. I added that one to my 'to-read' list, also. It looks good!

[Stacie]

Heather wrote: "Good choice, Stacie. I added that one to my 'to-read' list, also. It looks good!"

And it looks like one that I can understand (as opposed to some of the more 'color theory' ones I looked at) ;) Always a good place to start out.

[A.]

I'm thinking of that one too; I love the book cover...however, I'm still unsure. I'll see if it's in b&n. I like to browse before I decide :)

[A.]

I checked out the book @ b&n. I like it, but it's not what I'm looking for right now.

[Stacie]

I'm about 1/4 through this one and not really liking it so far. What I was hoping for was something with a little more explanation or description of how the colors were made, maybe even a discussion on when and where the methods were used and how they changed over time. There's some of that but mostly this book is a collection of semi-cohesive speculation and anecdotal description of the author's attempts to find out about the subject. It reads as though the author found out a handful of facts and then had to fluff them up to fill 400+ pages. However, this book does mention two others that might be more what I was looking for and I've added them to my "keep an eye out for these" list: The Craftsman's Handbook: "Il Libro dell' Arte" by Cennino Cennini and The Art Forgers Handbook by Eric Hebborn.

[Heather]

Thanks for the review about the book, Stacie. Hopefully your book will get better, though it sounds like you found a couple of others that might be good.

[Stacie]

Color: A Natural History of the Palette

Sadly, I had to force myself to finish this one but it's done, finally. I have slightly mixed feelings about this... there were some interesting bits, but Finlay's writing was so disorganized that reading it was frustrating. It's very hard for me to believe the woman is a journalist, she did a spectacularly bad job of concluding ideas/themes. The subject matter was interesting, fascinating even, but the writing was not well done. As a whole, the book was not effective at communicating its information.

[Heather]

Thank you for sharing your review, Stacie. I think I won't voluntarily get to that one on my list of things to read. I commend you for actually finishing the book! I would have probably put it down after your first comment February 1st when you said after being 1/4 through it that you didn't like it thus far. I hope you will again participate in the challenge for March and I really hope you find a much easier to read book! Good luck!