Introduction

Colour Chart: Reinventing Colour, 1950 to Today takes the commercial colour chart as its point of departure, addressing the impact of mass-produced colour on the art of the past sixty years. It is the first major exhibition devoted to the shifting moment in twentieth-century art when artists began to perceive colour as 'readymade' rather than as a vehicle of spiritual or emotional content.

Colour Chart celebrates a paradox: the beauty that occurs when artists assign colour decisions to chance, readymade source, or arbitrary system. Midway through the twentieth century, long-held convictions regarding the spiritual truth or scientific validity of particular colours gave way to an excitement about colour as a standardised commercial product. The Romantic quest for personal expression instead became Andy Warhol's "I want to be a machine"; the artistry of mixing pigments was eclipsed by Frank Stella's "straight out of the can; it can't get better than that."

Explore the artists featured in the exhibition

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Colour Lab

The exhibition also features an interactive space: Colour Lab. Children and adults can experiment with colour with the giant magnetic boards, play 'Colour sudoku' or create their own 'Colour code'.

There is also a special presentation of the University of Liverpool's research project focused on the visual perception of colour and digital colour calibration. Colours look different on different digital display devices – projectors, monitors and so on. Specialised hardware can be used to calibrate the colours so they display correctly. This project demonstrates that humans also have a remarkable ability to calibrate colour in the brain, as we all perceive certain colours in approximately the same way. Visitors can test their own colour judgements in the room.

Colour Chart: Reinventing Colour, 1950 to Today was curated by Ann Temkin, Chief Curator of Painting and Sculpture at The Museum of Modern Art, New York. At Tate Liverpool the exhibition is organised by Christoph Grunenberg, Director, and Sook-Kyung Lee, Exhibitions & Displays Curator.

Supported by European Regional Development Fund
With additional support from the American Patrons of Tate, courtesy of The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation