Author(s): James Fox

History | Art | Anthropology | Theory

The world comes to us in colour.  But colour lives as much in our imaginations as it does in our surroundings, as this scintillating book reveals.

Each chapter immerses the reader in a single colour, drawing together stories from the histories of art and humanity to illuminate the meanings it has been given over the eras and around the globe.  Showing how artists, scientists, writers, philosophers, explorers and inventors have both shaped and been shaped by these wonderfully myriad meanings, James Fox reveals how, through colour, we can better understand their cultures, as well as our own.

Each chapter offers a fresh perspective on a different epoch, and together they form a vivid, exhilarating history of the world. ‘We have projected our hopes, anxieties and obsessions onto colour for thousands of years,’ Fox writes.  ‘The history of colour, therefore, is also a history of humanity.

Review: A book to brighten the dullest days -- Rachel Campbell-Johnston * The Times (Books of the Year) *
A brilliantly fluent and readable history of colour -- Honor Clerk * Spectator (Books of the Year) *
Fairly shimmers with Fox's eye for arresting facts and anecdotes -- Kassia St Clair * Times Literary Supplement *
Intelligent, vividly written ... I'm going to buy three copies -- Laura Freeman * The Times *
Flits with enthusiasm and lightly worn learning from Bronze Age gold-workers to Turner, Titian to Yves Klein -- Simon Ings * Daily Telegraph (Books of the Year) *
Colour becomes a philosophical feast - astrophysics, the origins of civilisation, a palette of moral associations -- Ed Smith * New Statesman (Books of the Year) *
A manual to navigate and enjoy the extraordinary design of the world around us -- Anna Galbraith * Mail on Sunday *
Leads down some wonderful rabbit holes -- Chris Allnutt * Financial Times *
A book that makes you want to paint -- Joad Raymond * BBC History Magazine *

Author Biography: James Fox is Director of Studies in History of Art at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and a BAFTA-nominated broadcaster. His many acclaimed BBC television documentaries include programmes about British art, Japanese culture and an enduringly popular history of colour in art.