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Encyclopedia of Color Science and Technology pp 102–107Cite as

Chevreul, Michel-Eugène

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Michel-Eugène Chevreul (1786–1889) is one of the most important chemists of nineteenth-century France. A pioneer of organic chemistry, he was twice President of the French Academy of Sciences. His work changed dramatically after his appointment as director of the dyeing department of the Gobelins Manufacture in Paris, where he worked for almost 60 years. At the Gobelins, he developed a considerable amount of work on color, including color classification, color applied to industry, as well as his most famous book on simultaneous contrast of colors, which had a great impact on several generations of artists as well as on color teaching. His exceptional longevity helped him to publish many books and hundreds of scientific papers, most of them on color topics. His 100th birthday was celebrated as a national event; he finally died at 103. His book The Principles of Harmony and Contrast of Colors and their Applications to the Arts [1] was once considered one of the 12 most...

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References

  1. Chevreul, M.-E.: De la loi du contraste simultané des couleurs… Pitois-Levrault, Paris (1839) (The latest English translation is: The Principles of Harmony and Contrast of Colors and their Applications to the Arts (1855). Kessinger Publishing LLC, Whitefish, MT (2009))

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  2. Burchett, K.E.: Twelve books on color. Color. Res. Appl. 14(2), 96–98 (1989)

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  3. Chevreul, M.-E.: Recherches chimiques sur les corps gras d’origine animale. F.-G. Levrault, Paris (1823)

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  4. Chevreul, M.-E.: Considérations générales sur l’analyse organique et sur ses applications. F.-G. Levrault, Paris (1824)

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  5. Chevreul, M.-E.: Recherches physico-chimiques sur la teinture. Comptes rendus des séances de l’Académie des Sciences X, 121–124 (1840)

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  6. Heila, E.: The Chevreul color system. Color. Res. Appl. 16(3), 198–201 (1991)

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  7. Roque, G.: Art et science de la couleur: Chevreul et les peintres, de Delacroix à l’abstraction, 2nd edn. Gallimard, Paris (2009)

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  8. Chevreul, M.-E.: Cercles chromatiques de M.-E. Chevreul, reproduits au moyen de la chromocalchographie. Digeon, Paris (1855)

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  9. Chevreul, M.-E.: Exposé d’un moyen de définir et de nommer les couleurs, d’après une méthode précise et expérimentale…. Didot, Paris (1861)

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  10. Chevreul, M.-E.: Des couleurs et de leurs applications aux arts industriels. Baillière, Paris (1864)

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  11. Laissus, Y.: Un chimiste hors du commun: Michel-Eugène Chevreul. In: Sublime Indigo, exhib. cat, pp. 143–146. Musées de Marseille/Office du livre, Marseille (1987)

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  12. Chevreul, M.-E.: Sur la généralité de la loi du contraste simultané; Réponse de M. Chevreul aux observations de M. Plateau… Comptes rendus des séances de l’Académie des Sciences 58, 100–103 (1864)

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  13. Morrone, M.C., Burr, D.C., Ross, J.: Illusory brightness step in the Chevreul illusion. Vision Res. 34(12), 1567–1574 (1994)

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  14. Kemp, M.: The Science of Art. Optical Themes in Western Art from Brunelleschi to Seurat. Yale, New Haven (1992)

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  15. Mollon, J.D.: Chevreul et sa théorie de la vision dans le cadre du XIXe siècle. In: Roque, G., Bodo, B., Viénot, F. (eds.) Michel-Eugène Chevreul: un savant, des couleurs, pp. 137–146. Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle/EREC, Paris (1997)

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  16. Chevreul, M.-E.: Compléments d’études sur la vision des couleurs…. Firmin-Didot, Paris (1879)

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  17. Gage, J.: Chevreul between Classicism and Romanticism. In: Gage, J. (ed.) Colour and Meaning: Art, Science and Symbolism, pp. 196–200. Thames and Hudson, London (1999)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris, France

    Georges Roque

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  1. Georges Roque
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Correspondence to Georges Roque .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Modern, Optical Instrumentation, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

    Ming Ronnier Luo

  2. School of Design, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK

    Ming Ronnier Luo

  3. Graduate Institute of Colour and Illumination, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China

    Ming Ronnier Luo

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Roque, G. (2016). Chevreul, Michel-Eugène. In: Luo, M.R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Color Science and Technology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-8071-7_245

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