Workshop– Color as Data

In August 2021, I was invited to teach a seminar in Virtual/Material: Color/Pigment, a workshop for graduate students organized by Penn State and funded by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation. This workshop gave participants the opportunity to explore the history of color from both a technical and digital art perspective through seminars, demonstrations, and hands-on labs. Through this immersive experience, attendees gained a deeper understanding of the production and use of historical colorants, as well as the impact of digital cultures on how historians approach the study of color.

The goals of my seminar, “Color as Data,” were to:

• Explain the basics of color quantization
• Examine how GLAM institutions are utilizing color data
• Surface some challenges in using color data for art-historical research
• Introduce students to color analysis using Python in Google Colaboratory