With Christopher Michlig, Artist, Author, and Professor of Art at the Clark Honors College, University of Oregon.

Color carries meaning across centuries, across cultures, across the aisle at the grocery store. Color is one of the most powerful and pervasive symbolic languages humans have ever developed, and its significance shifts constantly depending on who’s using it, and when.

In this interdisciplinary lecture – drawn from his Clark Honors College course 12,000 Colors – Michlig takes a chromatic tour through history, culture, psychology, and color theory – one color at a time. Each color becomes a lens for examining how symbolism, emotion, and meaning have evolved through works of art and literature, through film and fashion, through product design and trend forecasting, through politics and pop culture.

Why does a single color come to signify power in one era and subversion in the next? How do brands, filmmakers, and artists harness color to shape what we feel before we’ve registered what we’re seeing? And what does the color we’re drawn to or repelled by reveal about the world we live in?

Attendees will leave with a deeper understanding of how color quietly shapes our tastes, our emotions, and the culture around us.

Science Pubs are a casual lecture series located in fun venues across the region, recommended for ages 10 and over.

Accessibility: Wheelchair Accessible Entrance
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