THE COLOUR IN CULTURAL MONUMENTS AND MODERN ART

Specialization / Direction

Upon successful completion of the course, students will: • sharpen the sensitivity of the eye of the -different disciplines- involved in the rehabilitation project • understand the relationship between the symbolic value of the wider environment of the monuments, but also the monument itself, through the nuances in the degree of saturation or texture/materiality, as an element of its identity • be trained in the critical evaluation of colour in monuments

The aim of the course is not to provide knowledge about colour, directly exploitable in a project of restoration, reuse-redesign-expansion, care, but to sharpen the sensitivity of the gaze of the ― coming from different disciplines― contributors of the project, through the meeting of one with the gaze of the other. Understanding that ―although the legitimate choices may be multiple, depending on the degree of commitment to historicity and authenticity, the interest in symbolic load, the wider environment, the neighbourhoods, the desired atmospheres and so on― any variation in hue, degree of saturation or texture/materiality may have a critically significant impact on the identification of the site/monument. Participants are invited to organise a critical presentation of cases of intervention of their own choice, identifying and commenting on the components of ―in their opinion― successful operation or failure. Wondering why Kandinsky's "sensitive individual" would have faced challenges to compare the pink of a Marc Rothko color field with the pink of a pair of underwear, even if he/she owned underwear of the exact hue, saturation, and brightness. Wondering why the average believer lumps together the icons of the churches on Egnatia Street with those of the Church of St. Nicholas Orphanos, although they have little in common regarding the dominant wavelength of the color spectrum, the degree of saturation, etc. The frequency with which the great figures of experimental aesthetics did not resist as much as they could the allure of the direct reduction of a conclusion from a personal experience to a self-evident axiom, reinforces the suspicion that the cosmogonic rejection ―by the heroic Bauhaus of Kandinsky and Itten, but also by the so-called deconstructionis or Beuys’ models― of the certitudes of the academic educational model, did not necessarily mean the avoidance of the installation of new certitudes ―in fact of a new academicism. Thus, the workshop rather accepts the principle of "there are no rules; however, it is necessary ―at any time― to draw conclusions". Comparative commentary of examples, through which some aspects of the complexity of the issue are sought to become clear, as well as some connections between the various ways of operating and the cultural context, the particular attitude of the project's contributors to the issue of conservation ethics in general, and their approach to the project in question.

30-12-2023