The experience of colour underwent a significant change in the second half of the nineteenth century, as new coal tar-based synthetic dyes were devised for the expanding textile industry. These new, artificial colours were often despised in artistic circles who favoured ancient and more authentic forms of polychromy, whether antique, medieval, Renaissance or Japanese. However faded, ancient hues were embraced as rich, chromatic alternatives to the bleakness of industrial modernity, fostering fantasized recreations of an idealized past.
The interdisciplinary essays in this collection focus on the complex reception of the colours of the past in the works of major Victorian writers and artists. Drawing on close analyses of artworks and literary texts, the contributors to this volume explore the multiple facets of the chromatic nostalgia of the Victorians, as well as the contrast between ancient colouring practices and the new sciences and techniques of colour.
Charlotte Ribeyrol is Associate Professor at the University of Paris-Sorbonne, a Marie Curie Fellow at the University of Oxford (2016-2018) and a member of the Institut Universitaire de France since 2015. Her main field of research is the influence of Ancient Greece on Victorian painting and literature, particularly in the works of A.C. Swinburne, J.A. Symonds and Walter Pater. Thanks to her interdisciplinary collaboration with chemists from the POLYRE programme (supported by Sorbonne Universities), she is now exploring the importance of the materiality of colour in the works of major Victorian writers and artists, notably William Morris.
Title: The Colours of the Past in Victorian England (Cultural Interactions: Studies in the Relationship Between the Arts)
Author:
ISBN: 9783034319744
Binding:
Publisher: Peter Lang AG, Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften
Publication Date: 2016-06-04
Number of Pages: 310
Weight: 0.4719 kg
Charlotte Ribeyrol has edited a wonderful collection of essays that deepens our appreciation of material culture and broadens our understanding of colour in the revolutionary nineteenth century.
(Adam Lee, Journal of Pre-Raphaelite Studies 27/2018)
Appealing to literary and art historical scholars alike, The Colours of the Past in Victorian England offers a new way of observing nineteenth-century visual culture by revealing the visual and linguistic chromatic vibrancy of Victorian England.
(Sarah Hook, BAVS Newsletter 18.1 2018)