Michel Pastoureau, losing his sight, publishes a history of color in painting
The medievalist, author of over a hundred essays on the symbolism of colors and animals, is battling a rare autoimmune disease that affects his vision. At 79, he publishes "La Couleur dans la peinture. De la préhistoire au XXᵉ siècle" with Seuil.
Michel Pastoureau, the French medievalist best known for his decades-long study of the cultural history of colors and animals, has published a new book, "La Couleur dans la peinture. De la préhistoire au XXᵉ siècle," out with Seuil, according to Le Monde.
The book arrives as Pastoureau, 79, contends with a rare autoimmune disease that affects his eyesight, Le Monde reports. Asked about the paradox of writing on color while his own vision fails, Pastoureau offered a characteristically conceptual answer: "Les couleurs sont des catégories mentales, il n'est pas besoin de les voir pour les penser" — colors are mental categories, he said, and one need not see them to think them.
Pastoureau has built a singular body of work over more than a hundred essays, tracing how societies have assigned meaning to colors — blue, black, green, red — and to animals across medieval and modern history. The new volume extends that project into the specific terrain of painting, spanning from prehistory to the twentieth century.
Sources
This article was written from these reports.
