SAY WHAT YOU SEE
01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
CREAM ALMOND SAND OATMEAL GINGER CHAMPAGNE SULPHUR PRIMROSE LEMON MUSTARD GOLD HONEY APRICOT AMBER ORANGE RUST MARIGOLD
18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34
PEACH SHELL EGGSHELL SALMON BRICK COPPER TERRACOTTA PAPRIKA TOMATO MELON RASPBERRY BERRY FUCHSIA ROSE PLUM CHERRY WINE
35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51
THISTLE HEATHER AUBERGINE GRAPE AMETHYST LAVENDER VIOLET BLUEBERRY SLATE TURQUOISE JADE AQUAMARINE SAGE KIWI MINT AVOCADO LIME
52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67
PISTACHIO MOSS OLIVE STONE BISCUIT CINNAMON WALNUT TOFFEE CARAMEL CHESTNUT CHOCOLATE COCOA COFFEE CHARCOAL MUSHROOM OYSTER
Since we developed the use of language, we have borrowed words from things in the world around us to describe the colours that we see. The word for pink originally came from flowers known as pinks (from the genus Dianthus) due to their frilled petal’s relation to the 14th century verb ‘to pink’, still used today in the as in ‘pinking sheers’. Our language has evolved dramatically since then and, as with so many words, the ties to its origin have virtually been lost. Far removed from its beginnings, the word ‘pink’ is now widely understood as referring to the rosy band of hues ranging from salmon to magenta. Of the eleven basic colour terms that we have in English, only orange is still regarded as descriptive, attributed to the hue of the fruit. Originally derived from Sanskrit, the word first appeared in English, in the 14th century, after the Persian and Arabic form, nãranj, was adopted by European languages.
Compared to the millions of hues our eyes can detect, our colour vocabulary is limited. Despite appearing to be well defined and understood, our basic colour terms are open to a surprising amount of interpretation, failing to truly capture the world we see. English has evolved to include thousands of terms for colours but only a tiny percentage of these exist as abstract terms. Most are re-appropriated from tangible things like lemons and lavender, as an attempt to articulate even a fraction of the colours we experience. These images do not aim to present a true reproduction of each colour or object. Rather they are a visual reminder of where some of our words for colours come from, their inherently descriptive nature and their undeniable connection to the often mundane objects in the world around us.