CANCELLED

IFAM and TOKo Santa Fe with SITE Santa Fe present a discussion of several millennia of blue hues by Senior Consultant at the Pantone Color Institute, author, editor, trend and color forecaster, and Creative Director of the International Folk Art Market, Keith Recker.

34,000-year-old evidence of twisted wild flax fibers, some of which were dyed blue, suggest that ancient humans found blue attractive enough to master the complex and counter-intuitive process of extracting it from the green leaves of certain plants. However, most accounts of human color affinities neglect blue to focus on black, white and red. Pantone’s choice of Classic Blue as the 2020 Color of the Year is a fitting occasion to discuss blue’s fundamental role in the visual cultures of many peoples around the world, as well as the profound and varied associations it carries with it. Nourished by that discussion, we can better understand blue’s role in 2020. Is it the egalitarian color of blue jeans or the mascot of tech giants like Facebook, Samsung, Intel, and others?  Is it the province of the world’s traditional dyers or the legal possession of a single contemporary artist? Does it suggest virtue or depression, stability, faith, intelligence or the unknown? Or something else yet again?

Senior Consultant at the Pantone Color Institute, author, editor, trend and color forecaster, and Creative Director of the International Folk Art Market, Keith Recker, will run through several millennia of blue hues in an effort to answer these questions. Keith will be signing his most recent book, True Colors: World Masters of Natural Dyes and Pigments, which will be available for purchase at the event.