INTERACTION OF COLOR
Josef Albers
Josef Albers: INTERACTION OF COLOR. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1963. First edition [2,000 copies]. Large quarto (c. 13 x 10 inches). Cloth slipcase containing text volume (cloth, 80 pp.) and cloth chemise-style box with index to plates (wraps, 48 pp.) and eighty folders (13 x 10 inches, opening to 13 x 20 inches) containing the plates, each with a protective tissue to prevent offsetting of the colors. Plates are printed in as many as twenty colors, with a combination of silk-screen (serigraph), four-color separation and photo-offset processes. Cloth slipcase slightly dusty with trivial wear to the glued cloth edges. Contents in uniformly fine condition with little evidence of handling. Overall, a nearly fine copy of this legendary edition.
The text and eighty plates form a summation of Albers' teachings in color relations. He demonstrates the facets of color changes, illusions, and influences produced by the multiple "interactions of color." An indispensable document of modern American art, issued in an unspecified [2,000 copies] limited edition.
Contains color studies by Josef Albers, Karen Allen, Arthur Anderson, Nicolas Apgar, Ruth Asawa, Rosilia N. Avery, Sally Bauer, William Bailey, Joanna Beal, Robert Bryden, Gerald Cinamon, T. Church, J. Clement, Patricia Coughlin, Paul Covington, Ferdinand A. De Vito, Marion Donovan, Rackstraw Downes, Robert Engman, Elinor Evans, Janet Fish, Tom Geismar, Harvey Harris, Eva Hess, T. Holzbog, Isabel Hooker, Warren Jennerjahn, May Kedney, Stephanie Kiefer, Thea Kliros, Eugene Kloszewski, Ursual Loengard, Louis Lo Monico, Joseph McCullough, James Mcnair, Jay Maisel, Keith Malmquist, Amy Meyers, Carl Miller, Elizabeth Moffitt, Richard Nelson, Edward Nussbaum, Melvin Offner, Berit Orr, Patricia Parker, Zdenka Popisil, Don Ray, Lola Roppel, Barry Schactman, Paula Schwartz, Stephanie Scuris, Sewell Sillman, Carol Sirot, Mark Strand, Julian Stanczak, Austin Towle, Hermione Tworkov, Miles Weintraub, Nancy Williams, Wilson Wright, Astrida V. Zarins, Robert Zimmerman, and Robert W. Zimmerman.
“Perhaps the most unusual publication ever to come from a university press, INTERATION OF COLOR represents a summation of the career of one of the most influential teacher-artists of the twentieth century. In Albers’ own words, “it shows a new way of teaching color, of studying color to make our eyes sensitive to the wonders of color interaction.”
“The three sections of this magnificent work — a text by Albers, 81 [sic] large folders reproducing more than 200 color studies, and an accompanying commentary on specific characteristics of single studies — are contained in a specially designed box. The folders, 13 x 20 inches when opened, are coordinated with the text, and illustrate each discussion with sample color studies. Of unusually high quality, they are printed in as many as 20 colors, by silk-screen, four-color separation, and photo-offset processes.
“Their manufacture, supervised by Albers, necessitated the development of a number of technical refinements expressly for this project. Conceived as a guide and teaching aid for artists, instructors, and students, INTERATION OF COLOR will unquestionably become the fundamental work in our time on the nature and the use of color.
“Important note: The nature of the author’s work and the unique conditions of production preclude a reprinting of this masterwork. The edition is limited to 2,000 copies. “ — Yale University Press, 1963
Josef Albers was one of the Bauhaus masters whose arrival in America profoundly influenced American modern art through his teachings at Black Mountain Colleg in North Carolina and later at Yale. Interaction of Color, a masterwork of one of the most influential artists of the twentieth century, is a brilliant display and explanation of the characteristics of color and the conditions under which certain optical phenomena occur.
Josef Albers (1888 – 1976) was a German-born American artist and educator whose work formed the basis of some of the most influential and far-reaching art education programs of the twentieth century.
Albers enrolled as a student in the Vorkurs of Johannes Itten at the Weimar Bauhaus in 1920. Although Albers had studied painting, it was as a maker of stained glass that he joined the faculty of the Bauhaus in 1922, approaching his chosen medium as a component of architecture and as a stand-alone art form. Walter Gropius, asked him in 1923 to teach in the preliminary course ‘Werklehre' of the department of design to introduce newcomers to the principles of handicrafts.
In 1925, Albers was promoted to professor, the year the Bauhaus moved to Dessau. At this time, he married Anni Albers (née Fleischmann) who was a student there. His work in Dessau included designing furniture and working with glass. As a younger art teacher, he was teaching at the Bauhaus among artists who included Oskar Schlemmer, Wassily Kandinsky, and Paul Klee. The so-called form master, Klee taught the formal aspects in the glass workshops where Albers was the crafts master; they cooperated for several years.
With the closure of the Bauhaus under Nazi pressure in 1933 the artists dispersed, most leaving the country. Neither Josef Albers nor his wife Anni spoke a word of English when they left Germany for the United States in 1933 to teach at Black Mountain College, an art and design school that had opened a few months before on a shoestring budget in rural North Carolina. Founded by a radical educationalist John Rice, Black Mountain was committed to experimentation, cross-disciplinarity and the idea that everyone should pitch in, whether it was to teach a class, or fix the plumbing.
The Alberses were defining influences on the school, whose students and teachers included many of the most influential US artists, designers and artisans of the late 20th century, from Cy Twombly and Robert Motherwell, to Willem and Elaine de Kooning. Merce Cunningham formed his first dance company there, John Cage staged his first happening, and they began lifelong collaborations with Robert Rauschenberg. The Alberses persuaded friends to help out, either by teaching like Xanti Schawinsky and Lyonel Feininger, designing buildings like Marcel Breuer and Walter Gropius, or donating books to the library like Alfred Barr and Walker Evans.
Josef Albers taught at Black Mountain College for sixteen years. In 1950 he joined the faculty at Yale University as chairman of the Department of Design.