Historic Deerfield’s 2024 Fall Forum, A Rich and Varied Palette: Coloring New England’s Past, convenes a group of leading researchers and scholars to explore the vast subject of color and its history. Research and publication in the history of color has been growing in recent decades, but few studies have examined color’s impact on specific cultural regions, such as New England. The program’s lectures will focus on the diverse topics of global colorants and textiles, lithoprints in 1840s New England, painted furniture at the Bath Academy, japanned furniture, Shakers’ color use and meanings, New England’s textile bleaching industries, chrome yellow and pink as pigments, and the paints and finishes of the Rockingham (Vermont) meeting house.
Historic Deerfield is home to one of the finest collections of New England architecture, interiors, and decorative arts of the 18th and 19th centuries. Rich in locally made and imported objects, the collection ranges widely from painted and japanned furniture, dyed, painted, and printed textiles, embroidered needlework and samplers, and paintings, drawings, watercolors and colored prints and maps. The museum’s Library also features the superb collection of Stephen L. Wolf (1917 – 2008), composed of pamphlets, trade catalogs, periodicals, and ephemera on applied color dating from the late 1500s to the present.
Despite the pervasive misconception of drabness, New England embraced color as a reflection of refinement and status, a visual display of commerce and the global economy, and a defining element of cultural difference, regional identity, and social and racial hierarchies. Through lectures, workshops, and tours, participants will experience the latest scholarship on color and gain a better understanding of the role of color in New England material life.
Image: Pair of Women’s Shoes, England, ca. 1765. Red-pink glazed, satin-weave wool (calamanco); unbleached plain weave linen; leather. Historic Deerfield, Museum Collections Fund Purchase with Funds Donated by James Ciaschini in Memory of his Mother Eva Ferioli, 2004.26
In-Person Base Price (does not include meals or pre-forum sessions)
$150 / $135 (members) / $55 (college students)
Virtual Price (lectures only)
$90 / $75 (members) / $55 (college students)
