A Colorful Truth

First they colorized Casablanca and It's a Wonderful Life, then they came for the Parthenon and Augustus. The difference being one should be in color, the other not.

From Harvard Science...

For artists of the Renaissance, the key to truth and beauty lay in the past. Renaissance artists assiduously studied the sculptures and monuments of Greece and Rome and emulated them in their own work. The inspiration they found in those ancient models has echoed down the centuries, influencing the appearance of Western art and architecture to this day.

If those Renaissance artists had looked more closely they might have found something that would have changed their vision of ancient art and had a profound effect on their own practice. That element was color.

We now know that the unblemished white surface of Michelangelo’s “David” would have been considered unfinished according to classical standards. The sculpture and architecture of the ancient world was, in fact, brightly and elaborately painted. The only reason it appears white to us is that centuries of weathering have worn off most of the paint.

I'm trying to picture the Lincoln Memorial in color.

To view more images, click here and for more info this Washington Post article is a good read.