More background on competing histories of color harmony, and a reprise of episodes from Season 1, Color Theory Wars parts 1 and 2.

Emily Noyes Vanderpoel, Color Problems: A Practical Manual for the Lay Student of Color, Sacred Bones Records publisher

Newton's Optiks, 1704, Project Gutenberg ebook

Goethe's Theory of Colors, 1810 (1840 translated by Charles Lock Eastlake) Project Gutenberg ebook

Schopenhauer's On Vision and Colors, 1816, AbeBooks

Spinal Tap, Jazz Odyssey, 1984

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Guardian website: Do you see blue or green? This viral test plays with color perception

Colour Literacy Project: Resources

Science How Stuff Works: Earth's Oldest Color was Pink

Martin Bricelj Baraga (cyanometer art installation): Cyanometer

Color categories in thought and language, edited by C. L. Hardin and Luisa Maffi. Cambridge University Press, New York: 1997

Encyclopedia of Color Science and technology (UC Irvine): World Color Survey

Space.com: Parsec

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Sharing a project I designed based upon Mary Gartside and Emily Noyes Vanderpoel's color methodologies. Try it for yourself, or with a class.

Link to project description (Google Doc):

Color Project: Mary Gartside and Emily Noyes Vanderpoel

Link to video of presentation on Gartside and Vanderpoel's methodologies (on Vimeo):

MCAD 2022 Faculty Biennial Forum Presentation by Ed Charbonneau

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Color and Emotion, the topic of a 5-week online course I have designed and will be teaching in March/April 2025 for the Continuing Education Department of the Minneapolis College of Art and Design.

Color and Emotion: Experience and Aesthetic Awareness
Online course, five weeks
Wednesday evenings
March 5 - April 9 (off March 19)
7-9:30 pm CT
Course website

Mark Rothko at MoMA

Michelangelo Sistine Chapel

Michelangelo Doni Tondo, Uffizi Galleries

Coca-Cola and Santa Claus

Crane bathroom tiles and fixtures

Auntie Mame, 1958 Movie Trailer

The Velvet Underground, Who Loves the Sun, Loaded, 1970

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Welcome to Season 4!

Lost and Found: Abbott Thayer and The Study of Camouflage. Martin Stevens

Dazzle Camouflage. Wikipedia

Neuroanatomy, Retina. Navid Mahabadi and Yasir Al Khalil, NIH, Aug. 8, 2023

The Confetti Illusion: This optical illusion tricks you into seeing different colors. How does it work? Nicoletta Lanse, Live Science, May 19, 2021

The ‘Confetti Illusion’ Makes Fruit Appear Riper Than It Really Is. Katharina Menne, Scientific American, Aug. 19, 2024

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The final episode of Season 3. A reflection on the past three seasons.


The Book of Colour Concepts, Alexandra Loske and Sarah Lowengard, Taschen 2024

Color Theory: A Critical Introduction, Aaron Fine, Bloomsbury Visual Arts, 2021

Magenta + Green = Blue? Instagram video reel

Black Flag, TV Party, 1982

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Podcast website with access to all episodes also at Chromosphere: The Color Theory Podcast

Interview with Gamma Jeanne; a departure from our more in-depth discussions of color theory. Jeanne's career as an artist spans over nine decades and includes working with acrylic paints in the 1940s and being at the center of department store design in the 1950s. Our conversation is wide-ranging as it addresses an artist's inner drive to create and form connections with people.

Relevant links:

The Terrazzo Jungle
By Malcolm Gladwell
The New Yorker
March 7, 2004

Victor Gruen; Gruen Associates
Southdale Center
Edina, Minnesota, USA

Gruen (formerly The Gruen Transfer)
Australian Broadcast Corporation

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Podcast website with access to all episodes also at Chromosphere: The Color Theory Podcast

CNN online article: Wear red and green to experience the Purkinje effect during the total solar eclipse

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