Reviews from Amazon

Amazon.com (0812971426) 50 reviews

Amazon.com (0340733292) 3 reviews

Amazon.co.uk (0340733292) 12 reviews

Amazon.co.uk (0812971426) 4 reviews

Amazon.ca (0340733292) 2 reviews

A selection of these reviews is given below

Reviews elsewhere on the web:

painting.about.com

The Independent

Victoria Finlay

Colour:Travels through the Paintbox

If you want to paint you expect to be able to buy whatever colours you want fairly simply - you don't expect to worry that some will be hard to find or too expensive. Today, that is a reasonable expectation, but it wasn't always that way. At one time your painting could well have had to wait until you had the right pigment, and then you would have needed to be as much chemist as artist. In Colour:Travels through the Paintbox Victoria Finlay tells the stories of lots of many of the colours that you might see in art galleries.

It wasn't easy though, Finlay had to travel far and wide to try to find the information she wanted. Was cow's urine really an ingredient of Indian Yellow? Why was purple an imperial colour, and where did it come from? And why was blue used so sparingly in old paintings? Then there's red, the colour of blood, and as such red ochre plays a significant part in Australian Aboriginal ceremonies. The red colour of cochineal really is blood - of an insect.

Finlay writes well, and the central theme of colour provides an excellent framework to hold together the fascinating tales of her quests. Whether you like reading travel books or are looking for information about the origins of the colours you find in your paintbox, you won't be disappointed with this book.

Note: The US version of this book has the subtitle A Natural History of the Palette

Amazon.com info
Paperback 448 pages ISBN: 0812971426 Salesrank: 26749 Weight:0.85 lbs
Published: 2003 Random House Trade Paperbacks
Amazon price $11.56
Marketplace:New from $9.96:Used from $6.40
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Amazon.co.uk info
Paperback 512 pages ISBN: 0340733292 Salesrank: 18658 Weight:0.82 lbs
Published: 2003 Sceptre
Amazon price £7.44
Marketplace:New from £4.99:Used from £3.77
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Amazon.ca info
Paperback 512 pages ISBN: 0340733292 Salesrank: 106404 Weight:0.82 lbs
Published: 2003 Hodder
Marketplace:New from CDN$ 6.94:Used from CDN$ 5.77
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Product Description

Discover the tantalizing true stories behind your favorite colors.
For example: Cleopatra used saffron—a source of the color yellow—for seduction. Extracted from an Afghan mine, the blue “ultramarine” paint used by Michelangelo was so expensive he couldn’t afford to buy it himself. Since ancient times, carmine red—still found in lipsticks and Cherry Coke today—has come from the blood of insects.

Carol Lyons reviews "Color" *****
"Color" by Victoria Finlay is a fascinating investigation of color, packed with information, stories, and anecdotes. One example of the historic mysteries of color is the chapter about orange. This is a surprising book for anyone curious, who may or may not be an artist.

Okay, but not what I expected ***

I think the editors/publishers did the reader a disservice when they renamed this book for the American publication. The book's original UK title was "Color: A Journey Through the Paintbox", which more accurately describes this book as a travelogue with color as the roadmap. It also more accurately describes the color history aspect as focusing specifically on fine art and paint. The word "palette" in the American title suggests the author will investigate other palettes such as fashion design and graphic design and interior design and nature and food and so forth. She makes very very brief dalliances into these realms but they are sidetracks, not the meat of the book.

So I was expecting a book more focused on history and a more all-encompassing history than the book provided. I really didn't want to read eight pages of how the author got from Beirut to some remote village. Perhaps that was partly my fault, since although the book was renamed and misnamed, Amazon's description did mention that it was a travelogue.

But even as a history travelogue, I was left wanting. The author doesn't make much of an effort to connect the reader of the modern world to the history she is writing about. She delves as far back as prehistoric times with different colors, and ventures as far forward as mid 19th century, but never goes farther. It is probably the natural tendency of an author of history to forget the value of the present, but without making the connection between past and present, the value of the book is significantly diminished.

One very odd and curious aspect of the book is the author's imaginative wanderings. For example in the chapter on orange, the author has been unable to find any real reference to the origins of the color, so she makes up a story of a Spanish Jew who flees through North Africa, back up into Europe, settling in Italy where he made orange varnishes for violins. Its an entirely made up story based on nothing but the author's own runaway imagination. I can't fault the author for having an imagination, but the editor did her no favors in allowing these excerpts into a non-fiction book.

Very well-written ****

This book was interesting not only for the information about colors, but also for the author's travels. She went to great lengths to get to the source of some colors, and along the way educates the reader about old customs and cultures. It made me look at everything around me a little more attentively, - really noticing the color (Is that blue, indigo or violet?) and thinking about where that color source may have been acquired. It was all very fascinating and well-written. However, I think the book could be a great basis for a documentary or mini-series. I'd like to be able to see the paintings Finlay references, and watch people making the colors. This is the book's one deficiency; the illustrations are all in the middle (and there aren't many) and I had to keep flipping forward or back to see them as they were referenced in the text.

This is a travel journal... Not a history, or a reference work. **

As a graphic designer and color enthusiast I was excited to dig into this book. The actual text however is 80% personal minutia detailing to the author's attempt to find relevant content to put into her book. Actual color history is very scanty. Overall, I found the book to be longwinded and self-indulgent--but most important, and it didn't deliver on its promise.

This book is not dissimilar to an Anthony Bourdain TV episode: "I'm riding in the taxi... it's a hot day... there's something playing on the radio... The taxi weaves in and out of traffic... We're going to meet X person... Will X person be able to tell me anything useful?... I'm nervous about meeting X person... I walk up a long narrow staircase to X person's office... " And so on... on and on and on. Again personal journaling comprises the vast majority of the content. If that's what you're looking for, great. But if you're looking for "A Natural History of the Palette"... not so much.

A colorful read *****
Colors is a great read for those interested in art, the artist pallet and travelling the world - I highly recommend.

Lightweight and somewhat irrelevant at times, but an enjoyable read ****

This is the perfect book to take with you on a long-distance flight - lightweight, easy to read (if you're interrupted and can't find where you were in the text, it doesn't really matter), packed with interesting anecdotes, and written in an endearingly chatty style.

Contrary to what the title might suggest, the book doesn't tell us very much worthwhile about colour itself, and the paperback edition is bereft of the kind of detailed illustrations that would be needed in any serious discussion of this highly complicated and intellectually demanding theme. But there are fascinating accounts of subjects as diverse as Australian aboriginal art (unfortunately without pictures), the history of the Lake District pencil industry, the Caribbean logwood trade in the seventeenth century, the violin makers of Cremona, and saffron cultivation near Saffron Waldon in medieval times, these being a very small selection of the dazzling array of topics that are covered. With varying degrees of success, the author has tried to relate all of her myriad stories and anecdotes to the origins of the principal colours.

There are signs at times that the book has academic pretensions. The text is footnoted, and at the end there is a fairly hefty bibliography. Now and again, there are cursory nods in the direction of cultural anthropology. But for good or ill, there's not much that's academic about the writing. In fact insofar as it is determined to entertain without making you think very much, I found the whole enterprise oddly reminiscent of the sort of articles that used to appear in the dear old Reader's Digest.

Be that as it may, there's nothing wrong in providing light and improving entertainment with a cultural flavour, and moreover there's a lot to be said for books as undemanding and pleasant to read as this one - books that you can happily dip in and out of at will, as the spirit moves you. Because the text is nowhere near as sufficiently focussed on colour as it ought to be, and because of the lamentable paucity and rather poor quality of the illustrations (it really won't do to write about colour or about art history without assisting the reader with plenty of well-reproduced pictures) I was very much tempted to give the book three stars out of five. But the text is so charming and so engaging and the enterprise so well meaning that rather against my better judgement, I have found myself giving it four.

A riot of colour *****

I was given this book as a present. It isn't a book I would have thought of buying unless I happened to find it while browsing in a bookshop, and I started reading it in the rather desultory way in which one does when given a book for free.

It didn't take long to get hooked! It's a collection of stories about the author's search for how the natural colours used for dye are made - going through each colour of the rainbow in turn.

The first synthetic dyes were invented 150 years ago and, as Ms Finlay discovered, that's long enough for the making of the original, organic dyes to have died out. However, in most cases, persistence paid of and you was able to visit the original sources and discover the stories behind the processes.

I learned a lot from this book, which is one you can either just dip into for individual tales, or read at length straight through. I would be happy to recommend it to anyone with an enquiring mind.

Great Book, but Beware *****

A truly excellent book all round with wonderful anecdotes. A must for anyone interested in colour, dyeing or painting. The book would be improved with more pictures but still it is a clearly a labour of love for the author. Check out the extensive bibliography - this is extensively researched (one of the great measures of non-fiction) and the notes are really worth reading too. One warning; I bought (through Amazon) the 2004 paperback published by Random House. 31 pages of chapter 10 were completely missing and the rubric (first letter on page one) of chapters 1 and 2 were missing... I suspect the print run was flawed and should have been spotted by Random House's proof readers. Imagine - the first letter of the first word of the first chapter is missing....Hmmmmm.... Amazon was great and offered a refund... no criticism of Amazon is intended but be aware... my copy was the American version "Color - A Natural History of the Palette"

A fantastic journey and a perfect guide *****

This is on my list of all time favourite books. I studied textile design and love old fabric, murals, paintings and stained glass. Colours have always had power to alter my mood and have greatly enhanced my life.

As always, something which we in todays modern world take for granted has much deeper meaning which we should all be aware of.

Most children think of colour as precious, and in this book Victoria proves that they are right, it has always been highly prized and has a magical and stunning history. I had long wondered where colour came from and she takes us along with her on her journey to uncover the secret.

She is a good tour guide and her own wonder shines through. A beautiful book for anyone who enjoys colour and art. Buy it for yourself and give it as a gift!

Gobsmacking *****

This is truely amazing - always fascinated by colour, but never, ever would I have guessed at the amazing stories behind them. So many unrelated puzzling trivials have been answered in this book, the old masters can be seen in a new light, even to an art heathen, the fact that the paintings have survived this long is indeed a feat of outstanding wonder, given the careful chemistry and make up of the materials they had to work with. A truely amazing, fascinating historical book, beautifully written, and I'm so glad I've had the opportunity to read it.

Should have been a great book **
This book should have been brilliant. A facinating approach to an engaging subject. But it was so badly written I couldn't finish it. The author put so much of her first person refences that it ready more like a diary than a story on colour. Perhaps that's what she intended but it wasn't for me. I bought a copy for a friend at the same time I bought mine and he couldn't finish it either.

Great Book but Beware *****

A truly excellent book all round with wonderful anecdotes. A must for anyone interested in colour, dyeing or painting. The book would be improved with more pictures but still it is a clearly a labour of love for the author. Check out the extensive bibliography - this is extensively researched (one of the great measures of non-fiction) and the notes are really worth reading too. One warning; I bought (through Amazon) the 2004 paperback published by Random House. 31 pages of chapter 10 were completely missing and the Initial (first letter on page one) of chapters 1 and 2 were missing... I suspect the print run was flawed and should have been spotted by Random House's proof readers. Imagine - the first letter of the first word of the first chapter is missing.... Amazon was great and offered a refund... no criticism of Amazon is intended but be aware...

A Must for any Artist or Art Lover ****

I am a working Artist, I use paint everyday and Spent 5 years in Art College and I never knew most of the information about pigments and paint that are in this book. It has changed the way I think of and use colour.I certainly have a new found awe of the old masters and their ability to produce such amazing images and for the colours to have survived!!I cannot highly recommend this book , in fact I emailed my old painting Lecturer and advised her to put this book on the cirriculum!

One book with two names *****
This is an exellent book, but do not be tempted to buy Travels through the Paintbox" by the same author. The two books are completely identical, except for the title! I bought both as a pair and found the contents were the same.

Colour Travels Through the Paintbox *****

This book has all the answers to how several colours came to us. After all, where else would you find out how we got Indian Yellow, that masterful, warmish lovely sunny yellow. I am not telling you here! Gotta get the book cause the adventure tied to it is so interesting.

This is the second time I am reading the book. The first time was a borrow and then I had a hankering to own it. It makes for a great middle of the night book or holiday book too. This is not only for people like me, people who use colour in their work such as artists. We see some semblance of colour every day (a lot of my family are colour blind). It is the tales that are intriquing: the extent that people went to for a certain colour, and the odd, sometimes actually bizarre ways in which colour was discovered. Once discovered it is also fascinating to know how it made its way around the world.

The extent that Victoria Finlay, the author, went to, tracking colour all over the world, that is admirable and amazing. And for artists and teachers and lovers of mysterious bits of information, it is a mandatory read.

A rainbow of anecdotes ****

If you've ever painted or dyed fabrics have you ever wondered where your colours originated? This book takes you on a journey through a painting and dye rainbow. Through numerous anecdotes and stories we go hunting for things like the source of Indian Yellow, the lapis lazuli mines of Afghanistan, and the delicate green of the celadon porcelains of China.

One thing this book does is show the unreliability of mythic stories on the source of various colours and the secrecy and economic strength these dyes and paints held for various people throughout the centuries. You will not gain all the secrets to the various colours of the rainbow in this book, but you will gain an appreciation for how much knowledge has been lost or corrupted over the centuries and how hard it was to develop simple things like colours that we take for granted today.

This book is recommended for anyone who has ever painted or dyed - you'll get a new appreciation for those people in the past whose skills we probably really don't truly appreciate today.

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