"Mondrian" color panel
Date: 1975-1985
Inventory Number: 2004-1-0258
Classification: Panel
Subject:
Maker: American
User: Edwin H. Land (1909 - 1991)
Cultural Region:
Place of Origin:
Dimensions:
225 x 167 x 70 cm (88 9/16 x 65 3/4 x 27 9/16 in.)
Description:
One of three large Mondrian panels used with the photometer 2004-1-0214a to study the Retinex theory of color vision. It is a collage of colored paper framed in wood and supported by a stand.
Here is how Land described this type of design (1983): "We prepared a laboratory display which we dubbed a 'Mondrian' (although it actually is closer to a van Doesburg), utilizing about 100 colored papers. A paper of a given color would appear many times in different parts of the display, each time having a different size and shape and each time being surrounded by a different set of other colored papers. One reason for the design was to prohibit the superposition of after images of areas onto other areas, and another reason for the design was to obviate explanations of results in terms of the size of shape or surrounding of any given paper."
Here is how Land described this type of design (1983): "We prepared a laboratory display which we dubbed a 'Mondrian' (although it actually is closer to a van Doesburg), utilizing about 100 colored papers. A paper of a given color would appear many times in different parts of the display, each time having a different size and shape and each time being surrounded by a different set of other colored papers. One reason for the design was to prohibit the superposition of after images of areas onto other areas, and another reason for the design was to obviate explanations of results in terms of the size of shape or surrounding of any given paper."
Signedunsigned
FunctionUsed by Land for his experiments with color vision (Retinex theory). It was also most likely used in Land's famous lectures on the same topic.
Primary SourcesEdwin H. Land, "The Retinex Theory of Color Vision," Scientific American 237 (1977): 108-128.
Edwin H. Land, "Recent Advances in Retinex Theory and Some Implications for Cortical Computations: Color Vision and the Natural Image," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 80 (1983): 5163-5169.
Edwin H. Land, "An Alternative Technique for the Computation of the Designator in the Retinex Theory of Color Vision," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 83 (1986): 3078-3080.
Edwin H. Land, "Recent Advances in Retinex Theory and Some Implications for Cortical Computations: Color Vision and the Natural Image," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 80 (1983): 5163-5169.
Edwin H. Land, "An Alternative Technique for the Computation of the Designator in the Retinex Theory of Color Vision," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 83 (1986): 3078-3080.
ProvenanceThis object belonged to Edwin H. Land and came from the Rowland Institute, Harvard University. Gift of the Edwin H. Land Family.
