Color Codes: Modern Theories of Color in Philosophy, Painting and Architecture, Literature, Music and Psychology - Hardcover

Riley, Charles A., II

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0874516714 ISBN 13: 9780874516715

Publisher: Univ Pr of New England, 1995

Synopsis

Color is an endlessly fascinating and controversial topic. "The first thing to realize about the study of color in our time is its uncanny ability to evade all attempts to systematically codify it," writes Charles A. Riley in this series of interconnected essays on the uses and meanings of color.
Color Codes draws heavily on interviews with many of today's leading artists - Roy Lichtenstein, Frank Stella, Peter Halley, Lukas Foss, A. S. Byatt, and others - as well as seminal texts by a wide range of thinkers including Wittgenstein, Derrida, Barthes, Schoenberg, Kandinsky, Albers, Joyce, Pynchon, and Jung. Although Riley finds remarkable parallels among the theories and techniques of various disciplines, his emphasis is on the individual nature of the color sense.
This resistance to a unified color theory gives the current aesthetic debate tremendous energy. "Because it is largely an unknown force, color remains one of the most vital sources of new styles and ideas, ready to be tapped by creative minds in the coming decades." In the studios of artists and composers, and in the recent writings of philosophers, psychologists, poets, and novelists, evidence of this emerging power is abundant. Creators, critics, and lay readers will find Color Codes accessible and stimulating.

About this title

About the Author

Charles A. Riley II, Professor of English at Baruch College, CUNY.

Reviews

Riley's richly rewarding scholarly study explores the multiple meanings of color in painting, from the bold experiments of Robert and Sonia Delaunay and the Fauves, to Matisse's key influence on Roy Lichtenstein, Frank Stella, David Hockney and Milton Avery to the spiritual use of color in Kandinsky, Gauguin, Van Gogh and the chromatic investigations of Georgia O'Keeffe, Robert Ryman and others. A thirst for an alternative, transcendental order motivated the philosophers Hegel, Oswald Spengler and Jacques Derrida in their theorizing on color, writes Riley, World Art correspondent and professor of English at Baruch College in New York. In architecture, he traces a renascence of color (Michael Graves, James Stirling); in music, he shows how chromaticism evokes the mind's complexity and spiritual yearnings (Wagner, Stockhausen, Schoenberg, Messiaen); in literature, he delves into structural analogies between color and language (Joyce, Proust, Pynchon, Wallace Stevens, A.S. Byatt). The theories of Freud, Jung and Gestalt psychologist Rudolf Arnheim help Riley elucidate the vital role of color in dreams, perception, emotion and memory. Illustrated.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

At the outset of this scholarly work, Riley (English, Baruch Coll., CUNY) states: "The first thing to realize about the study of color in our time is its uncanny ability to evade all attempts to codify it systematically." In six intricate essays, the author discusses uses of color by the foremost contemporary artists, composers, philosophers, authors, architects, and psychologists. Excerpts from the writings of such proponents of modernism as Barthes, Derrida, Kandinsky, Stella, Schoenberg, Messiaen, Le Corbusier, Joyce, Pynchon, and Jung, combined with Riley's impressively wide-ranging knowledge, demonstrate the unique and varied perceptions in the field. Throughout, Riley urges his readers to explore the elusive mysteries and powers of color, though the book requires a degree of familiarity with the cited artists and thinkers. Recommended primarily for academic libraries.
Joan Levin, MLS, Chicago
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Univ Pr of New England
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0874516714
• ISBN 13: 9780874516715
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 373