Collecting colour

About this book

Dr. Narayan Khandekar, distinguished scientist in the field of conservation and colour, will be delivering the Mondrian Lecture in De Doelen Rotterdam on Sunday 26 March. He will be doing so on the occasion of the presentation of the Sikkens Prize to Hella Jongerius. Khandekar is the director of the Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies, director of the Center for the Technical Study of Modern Art, and head of the Analytical Laboratory of the Harvard Art Museums. His interests lie in the technical study of paintings and painting materials. He has more than sixty publications to his name. In this book, Khandekar takes us on a tour of the amazing universe of the Forbes Pigment Collection, which at present is kept in the Strauss Center for Conservation and Technical Studies at Harvard University. This collection contains over three thousand natural and synthetic colouring agents. Khandekar shows the origins of the pigments and their cultural uses. At the same time, he demonstrates that pigments are essential building blocks of the unique nature of a work of art.