The New Color
“I prefer living in color.”
In 2002, I was invited to design a color course at Tufts University for students working with a range of technologies, from traditional and digital painting, printmaking, and photography to video, performance, and installation. Previous courses had focused primarily on paint mixing, but that approach was no longer sufficient. So I asked myself a question that would take me down an unexpected rabbit hole: What is color?
Answering this deceptively simple question gave me the opportunity to rethink the role of color not just in art, but across culture and society. This process changed my life, convincing me that color is not just a window to beauty, but a critical knowledge base for people living in the 21st century.
The New Color at UT Austin
Color operates at the intersection of multiple fields. Books about color are scattered across library shelves, from physics, neuroscience, and chemistry to art, design, psychology, and marketing. My approach has been to investigate multiple sources, ask lots of questions, and always seek to connect the dots.
The New Color is my flagship color literacy course. It covers the basics of color theory and unpacks the dense network of color codes at play in the world and in ourselves. Topics include color perception, basic color terms, color science, color order systems, pigments, color history, color interaction, color psychology, and color management.
My goal is for students to gain color skills essential for communication in the 21st century—not just for artists and designers, but for everyone.
Color Salons
These Wednesday evening lectures at UT Austin are open to the public. A central feature of my New Color course each spring, they emphasize the interdisciplinary nature of color literacy by presenting experts from fields as diverse as neuroscience, biology, art history, design, nutrition, film, fashion, and psychology.
