UV light uncovers ancient statue colors

[delalluvia]

Original Greek statues were brightly painted, but after thousands of years, those paints have worn away. Find out how shining a light on the statues can be all that's required to see them as they were thousands of years ago.

http://io9.com/5616498/ultraviolet-light-reveals-how-ancient-greek-statues-really-looked

Something we all already knew, but I always like to see it recreated.

[Meryl]

Hunh!  Very pretty, but I think I prefer the more tasteful white or grey. 

[Penthesilea]

Hunh!  Very pretty, but I think I prefer the more tasteful white or grey. 

Agreed. Colored they look a bit like annual fair attractions. I believe "tacky" was the word used in the article.
But then, maybe the examples diplayed are not well done, maybe modern scientists have not all wrong, but wrong enough to give a too colorful impression.

[delalluvia]

Or else we've been influenced by the Victorians of what taste should look like because - they had no clue.

 

Chances are they liked it like that back in ancient days.  Not subdued at all, and just as colorful as they could make it.  Coloration = money in those days because dyes and paints were relatively expensive to make.

So the more deeply, richly and brightly colored something was, the more money was obviously invested in it.

[bailey1205]

That's very interesting.

I really never thought about that.