12/08/2015

1979 Margaret Walch

"Nude Figure Blue / Joy Orange / Paper Pink / Cut-out Magenta / Gollage Green" are the color sample names in the section "The Colors of Matisse" in Margaret Walch's Color Source Book on page 89. They reassemble a selection of five primary colors in the hue and value that Matisse chose for his late paper collages. Among the palettes of other artists like Giotto, William Morris, or Sheila Hicks, the Color Source Book features significant color palettes of periods and art forms like Empire, Chinese porcelain, Scottish tartans, or Pop Art.

Through writing her own column on contemporary and historical fashion in the quarterly textile magazine American Fabrics (a guide for textile manufacturers with real physical fabric samples glued in it) Margaret Walch developed her expertise in the realm of color. In 1979 she published Color Source Book. It is the first of three color guides for both nonspecialist and professionals. In 1986 she became associated director of the Color Association of the US; an organization founded in 1915 to identify the direction of color trends, translate them into salable Color Forecasts in order to deliver the protocols to designers, retailers, and manufacturers. She points out, psychology, the economy, and our environment are the most important forces to influence our relation with color. High-visibility events, a celebrity, a movie, an artwork, anything that looks good has impact on our taste and values. Asked to pick her favorite color for 2008, she brings up Bamboo; a muted yellowed green, chosen from the associations' interior palette of the same year. She explains, in insecure times Bamboo “represents the stable green that is most on people’s minds.”