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Jul. 9th, 2012 11:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
charloweenIf you're very lucky, one day you'll find your way to a bit of writing that changes you.
The artist David Batchelor's book Chromophobia has quite literally changed how I see the world. I see colour differently, I look at the world differently, I'm more conscious of the "extreme prejudice" against colour in Western culture.
Usually, my serious academic reading tends towards the mercenary. I don't think I'm unusual in this: pick up book, find paragraphs useful to me, take citations, paraphrase to prove my own point, move on.
But a few months ago Batchelor gave an artist talk in the department, shared some of his work (I'm particularly taken with "Magic Hour"), and pointed out a few simple truths about the way colour has been regarded since the Ancient Greeks. He wonders why, since there is so much colour in the world, has there been such an effort to convince refined, educated, aesthetically sophisticated Westerners that the mark of refinement, education and sophistication is the absence of that same fundamental characteristic.
In Chromophobia, he writes: "...colour has been the object of extreme prejudice in Western culture. For the most part, this prejudice has remained unchecked and passed unnoticed. ...It is, I believe, no exaggeration to say that, in the West, since Antiquity, colour has been systematically marginalized, reviled, diminished and degraded. Generations of philosophers, artists, art historians and cultural theorists of one stripe or another have kept this prejudice alive, warm, fed and groomed." He argues this prejudice "masks a fear" of colour, and he calls this chromophobia.
Colour is therefore removed, devalued and diminished "in one of two ways. In the first, colour is made out to be the property of some 'foreign' body - usually the feminine, the oriental, the primitive, the infantile, the vulgar, the queer or the pathological. In the second, colour is relegated to the realm of the superficial, the supplementary, the inessential, the cosmetic. In one, colour is regarded as alien and therefore dangerous; in the other, it is perceived merely as a secondary quality of experience, and thus unworthy of serious consideration. Colour is dangerous, or it is trivial, or it is both."
Of course, he has plenty of compelling examples to back this up, but he also has the benefit of writing something that feels very true. Fashion works along exactly these lines: a kid can go out dressed all in pink, but the same thing in an adult woman seems embarrassingly childish. Or, take brightly coloured sun dresses: there's a shock of exoticism, and of overt femininity, no matter the cut or style. Grey-suited businessmen vs. costumes in a pride parade.
Or, how many duvet covers there are for sale in tastefully restrained muted shades. (That annoyed me before I'd heard of Batchelor's work.)
What I get from reading Chromophobia is the shock of being forced to see colour. Not that I couldn't have listed thirteen shades of green in a meadow, no: it's that genuinely, I think I'd see that meadow differently. Or that shop window. There's a persistence of the presence of colour, and a willingness in me to make different choices about how I think about colour.
It's been a few months of thinking back to what he'd said, and slowly nibbling away at the (short, effective) book - and there's been a lot going on in my world besides this - and it's been interesting to keep it at the back of my mind. It's helped me put words to the undefined feeling I've had for so long, not really understanding why I've been suspicious of bold colours and yet at the same time being unsatisfied with only black, white and grey.
It doesn't hurt that the book has a lovely prose style. It's a pleasure to read.
I'm sympathetic to those North Americans melting in the heat. Today I had on a long-sleeved t-shirt under a light cardigan to catch the 7pm bus from campus. When the Olympic torch relay came through town last week, more than one person was in a knitted sweater. Writing this, I'm in a sweatshirt and flannel pj pants. What I'm saying is, any time summer wants to start, I know a few islands in between the North Sea and the North Atlantic that would be down with that.
I mean. As much as I like those coats I bought yesterday, I don't really want to wear them yet.
The artist David Batchelor's book Chromophobia has quite literally changed how I see the world. I see colour differently, I look at the world differently, I'm more conscious of the "extreme prejudice" against colour in Western culture.
Usually, my serious academic reading tends towards the mercenary. I don't think I'm unusual in this: pick up book, find paragraphs useful to me, take citations, paraphrase to prove my own point, move on.
But a few months ago Batchelor gave an artist talk in the department, shared some of his work (I'm particularly taken with "Magic Hour"), and pointed out a few simple truths about the way colour has been regarded since the Ancient Greeks. He wonders why, since there is so much colour in the world, has there been such an effort to convince refined, educated, aesthetically sophisticated Westerners that the mark of refinement, education and sophistication is the absence of that same fundamental characteristic.
In Chromophobia, he writes: "...colour has been the object of extreme prejudice in Western culture. For the most part, this prejudice has remained unchecked and passed unnoticed. ...It is, I believe, no exaggeration to say that, in the West, since Antiquity, colour has been systematically marginalized, reviled, diminished and degraded. Generations of philosophers, artists, art historians and cultural theorists of one stripe or another have kept this prejudice alive, warm, fed and groomed." He argues this prejudice "masks a fear" of colour, and he calls this chromophobia.
Colour is therefore removed, devalued and diminished "in one of two ways. In the first, colour is made out to be the property of some 'foreign' body - usually the feminine, the oriental, the primitive, the infantile, the vulgar, the queer or the pathological. In the second, colour is relegated to the realm of the superficial, the supplementary, the inessential, the cosmetic. In one, colour is regarded as alien and therefore dangerous; in the other, it is perceived merely as a secondary quality of experience, and thus unworthy of serious consideration. Colour is dangerous, or it is trivial, or it is both."
Of course, he has plenty of compelling examples to back this up, but he also has the benefit of writing something that feels very true. Fashion works along exactly these lines: a kid can go out dressed all in pink, but the same thing in an adult woman seems embarrassingly childish. Or, take brightly coloured sun dresses: there's a shock of exoticism, and of overt femininity, no matter the cut or style. Grey-suited businessmen vs. costumes in a pride parade.
Or, how many duvet covers there are for sale in tastefully restrained muted shades. (That annoyed me before I'd heard of Batchelor's work.)
What I get from reading Chromophobia is the shock of being forced to see colour. Not that I couldn't have listed thirteen shades of green in a meadow, no: it's that genuinely, I think I'd see that meadow differently. Or that shop window. There's a persistence of the presence of colour, and a willingness in me to make different choices about how I think about colour.
It's been a few months of thinking back to what he'd said, and slowly nibbling away at the (short, effective) book - and there's been a lot going on in my world besides this - and it's been interesting to keep it at the back of my mind. It's helped me put words to the undefined feeling I've had for so long, not really understanding why I've been suspicious of bold colours and yet at the same time being unsatisfied with only black, white and grey.
It doesn't hurt that the book has a lovely prose style. It's a pleasure to read.
I'm sympathetic to those North Americans melting in the heat. Today I had on a long-sleeved t-shirt under a light cardigan to catch the 7pm bus from campus. When the Olympic torch relay came through town last week, more than one person was in a knitted sweater. Writing this, I'm in a sweatshirt and flannel pj pants. What I'm saying is, any time summer wants to start, I know a few islands in between the North Sea and the North Atlantic that would be down with that.
I mean. As much as I like those coats I bought yesterday, I don't really want to wear them yet.
Wrote this last night but never hit post. Oops.
Date: 2012-07-10 05:45 pm (UTC)Henry IV pt 1 did that to me, too. Incoherent! Joyfully!
Date: 2012-07-10 11:45 pm (UTC)It's less an art history book than a monograph on historical aesthetic bias. It's not very long, so I hope you can wedge it in your crazy-busy schedule.
(no subject)
Date: 2012-07-11 02:05 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2012-07-11 07:36 am (UTC)That said, looks like there's a copy at Robarts, if you have magical alumni powers that'll let you in the stacks. The other two universities are less mean about their collections. York's copy is out but Ryerson's is there 'cause it's in the reserve stacks. *twirls internet, holsters it*
(no subject)
Date: 2012-07-16 12:42 am (UTC)I bow to your mastery of the internet.