Blue: The History of a Color. [Hardcover]

Michel Pastoureau (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2001

Blue has a long and topsy-turvy history in the Western world. Once considered a hot color, it is now icy cool. The ancient Greeks scorned it as ugly and barbaric, but most Americans and Europeans now pick it as their favorite color. In this entertaining history, the renowned medievalist Michel Pastoureau traces the changing meanings of blue from its rare appearances in prehistoric art to its international ubiquity today in blue jeans and Gauloises cigarette packs.

Any history of color is, above all, a social history. Pastoureau investigates how the ever-changing role of blue in society has been reflected in manuscripts, stained glass, heraldry, clothing, paintings, and popular culture. Beginning with the almost total absence of blue from ancient Western art and language, the story moves to medieval Europe. As people began to associate blue with the Virgin Mary, the color entered the Church despite the efforts of chromophobic prelates. Blue was reborn as a royal color in the twelfth century and functioned as a formidable political and military force through the French Revolution. As blue triumphed in the modern era, new shades were created, and blue became the color of romance. Finally, Pastoureau follows blue into contemporary times, when military clothing gave way to the everyday uniform of blue jeans, and blue became the universal and unifying color of the Earth as seen from space.

With an exceptionally elegant design and strikingly illustrated with one hundred color plates, Blue tells the fascinating history of our favorite color and the cultures that have hated it, loved it, and created great art with it.

Editorial Reviews

Review

A miracle of poetry in the midst of academic rigidity. -- Telerama

. . . a rich volume, intelligently illustrated. . . . With sure-footed scholarship, trenchant opinions, Michel Pastoureau goes beyond a perfunctory visit: he makes us realize the importance of this material and avoids the errors of a number of other historians. -- Le Monde

. . . a delicious mix of erudition and lighthearted fun. -- Livres

Pastoureau's text moves us through one fascinating area of activity after another. . . . The jacket, cover and end-papers of this luscious book are appropriately blue; its double-columned text breathes easily in the space of its pages; it is so well sewn it opens flat at any place; and fascinating, aptly chosen color plates, not confined to the title color, will please even those eyes denied the good luck of being blue. -- William Gass, Los Angeles Times Book Review

Blue is both prettily produced and whimsically enjoyable. -- Julian Bell, Times Literary Supplement

Michel Pastoureau takes us into territory that could be made to feel impossibly dense and absurdly specialized. To his credit, the tour is brisk and challenging. -- John Loughery, Washington Post Book World

A generous, gorgeous book full of nearly 100 historical and artistic plates, all illustrating the meaning and role of the color blue in Western history. . . . Pastoureau has created something rare: a coffee table book that is also a good read. And not just a good read, but a compelling read. -- Brian Bouldrey, Chicago Tribune

Blue . . . is confident, stylish, well-turned out. . . . The book's sapphire glow will grace the most discriminating coffee tables. -- Jane Gardam, Spectator

This beautifully illustrated book is well written and informative, and makes an important contribution to the social history of art. -- Choice

In this beguiling and beautiful mixture of art book and social history, the distinguished French scholar shows how the rarest of all colors became the commonest. -- Emma Hagestadt and Boyd Tonkin, The Independent Magazine

The material history of a certain section of the spectrum, from the costly tones of the Virgin's cloak to uniforms, Picasso and jeans. History can make you blind, but some historians can make you see again. -- James Davidson, Daily Telegraph

From the Inside Flap

"Michel Pastoureau paints a massive canvas in which the history of one color becomes the history of culture itself. This is a study not of color as mere matter but as idea--presenting thousands of years of thinking in blue."--Michael Camille, author of The Medieval Art of Love and Glorious Visions

"Michel Pastoureau brilliantly uses the shifting meanings of blue to challenge a whole spectrum of assumptions about color and its symbolic value. . . . Thanks to this study, which is certain to become a classic, blue will never look the same again."--Jori Finkel and Jonathon S. Keats

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 216 pages
• Publisher: Princeton University Press (October 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0691090505
• ISBN-13: 978-0691090504
• Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 9.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #853,198 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

123 of 128 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars From sacred blue to blue jeans...., February 17, 2002

By 

Dianne Foster "Di" (USA) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Blue: The History of a Color. (Hardcover)

Woad, Indigo, Azurite, Lapis, Copper Silicate, Blue Vitriol are some of the sources of the color blue. BLUE, THE HISTORY OF A COLOR, by Michel Pastoureau, is a beautiful art history book, whose organizing principle is the color--blue. Pastoureau's book is a bit "Francocentered" but nevertheless, who better to reflect on blue than a Frenchman. BLUE is both informative and entertaining and a must for any serious art book collector. The photgraphy of various works of art--including selected stained glass windows from the early church--is stunning. The book is loaded with illustrations showing pages from psalters, cathedral windows, figurines, and other art.

For millions of years, the major colors for artistic expression were Black-White-Red. Ancient tales such as "Little Red Riding Hood", "Snow White", and "The Fox and the Crow" reflect this primary triad. The Romans considered blue an inferior color, especially since the Celts up North had discovered the leaves from the Woad plant could be made into a beautiful blue "pastel" suitable for body painting. The liturgal colors of the Catholic Church date from Roman times and are red-white-black (green was added later). However, at some point between the time the Romans lost Europe and the Catholic Church reentered recorded history, blue became associated with Mary the mother of Christ. When Abbe Suger built St. Denis, blue began to rival red for supremacy within the church, although blue never became a vestment color. When St. Louis built his Chapel and the Capet family became the rulers of France with Mary as their patron, the fleur de lis on a blue background became the family standard and the flag of France (fleur de lis = lily of Mary, although it may be a blue flag or iris).

No sooner had blue become THE color of colors, than the Protestants (Pastoureau calls them "Chromoclasts") demanded everything be turned black to reflect sin and penance. After they smashed a few thousand church windows, these reformers, who have been linked to capitalism, turned everything else black -- from telephones to automobiles. As Henry Ford once said, the customer can have any color he wants as long as it's black. Black went on to became the dress of high society--from stove pipe hats to tuxedoes to the little black dress.

During the Reformation, red and white had been dismissed by the Protestants but the shot heard round the world gave them a second chance as the new red-white-blue and blue-white-red flags led to military pants and coats in similar colors. But red and white were a dismal failure as they made targets of their wearers. Blue blends into the horizon so it has lasted longer as a battle garment. Although jungle fatigues and black commando suits are more often than not seen on modern battlefields, mess dress is still blue-white-red for many, and UN soldiers wear fleur-de-lis blue helmets. Blue eventually replaced black on the social front as descendents of the "Puritans" gave up black frocks for navy blue blazers and jeans.

Pastoureau covers iconography, iconology, symbolism, sociology, ethnology, the economic aspects of weaving, dyeing, and manufacture, and a host of other topics associated with the color blue. The book is incredibly rich in detail but far too short, and in the end it raises more questions than it addresses. Pastoureau points to many historical sources that have yet to be translated or fully examined, and art history majors looking for a thesis subject would be well advised to check out this book.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars What Foucault could have done for color, December 29, 2010

By 

S. B. Garcia (Mexico City, Mexico) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Blue: The History of a Color. (Hardcover)

A negative review of this book deemed the author "arrogant", "Francophile" and "contemptuous". It is true that this text is Western-focused, and Pastoureau is very clear from the beginning that he does not attempt to achieve a universal history of blue. However, while Franco-centrism is at times self evident, it never gets to the point of being annoying, much less depreciating the overall quality of his job. This is a beautiful, well-researched and much appealing text that serves much more as a question opener and debate setting object rather than a final word on the matter.

Pastoureau's work is chronologically ordered, and revolves around the central idea that blue was ignored for much of mankind's early history, until its faith started to change around the twelfth and the thirteen century for a number of ideological and technical reasons. According to this hypothesis, blue then suffered a radical transformation for good which enabled it to achieve the well known status of being the West's favorite color that we know today.

His prose is elegant and engaging, the translation is flawless and supporting pictures are carefully chosen to ensure the reader's commendation. I would, however, point out two weak points in the book:

1) It can be immediately appreciated that Pastoureau's historical expertise is at his best on the period covering from the Late Middle Ages to probably the seventeenth century (this is an achievement of its own, however). I found his command of relevant primary sources impeccable and his ideas strongly supported by the latter. As the book progresses, tough, the analysis becomes coarser, more speculative and less supported by historical research (though not less appealing, for sure). As a consequence, the text has a somewhat 'uneven' feeling in terms of depth. Analysis concerning the eighteenth century strays much from its original purpose, and the French Revolution simply occupies much of his thoughts (this is where Francophilia becomes the most obvious and I'm sure this particular section is what secured the arrogance claim by other reviews).

2) Color is a social construction. Pastoureau strongly advocates this idea throughout the book, which is also one of his most compelling arguments. Ironically, his strongest idea also contributes to what could be perceived as an undermining of his own arguments in the final chapters, where he simply slips the possibility that it might all be too subjective to tell for sure.

Overall, none of this should be upheld as a major argument to dismiss his work, a product of the most acute and distinctive French critical tradition. A fine book that must not be missed.

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book!, February 10, 2011

By 

rachel - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Blue: The History of a Color. (Hardcover)

Gorgeous illustrations and just a really cool topic, especially for those interested in both history and art. I gave this as a gift to someone for Christmas and they absolutely loved it.