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Congratulations! Congratulations to the eighty plus members who so far have paid their membership dues online for the 2010/2011 year using the new payment system. Already we are receiving very positive feedback from the State Chairs and Secretaries who are finding this an easier and much more effective way to access immediate member details.
With only easy 4 pages of questions, less than 30 boxes of information, and choice pre-determined answers - most people complete the process within a matter of minutes. With funds coming in faster, this will make it easier to fund website developments and membership benefits. You will soon be emailed information about the Colour Society’s first Webinar! This historic event is being coordinated by NSW Chair Judith Brigg’s and will feature our own Bec Harkness. For the first time regional and rural Australia will have equal access to the Society. For those with member friends who still have no Internet access - maybe you can share the event with them. And for those with friends wanting to join the Society, you can now help them to do it online. And for those wanting to provide gift memberships for friends - please ensure you gain their approval first.
And on a sadder note - a message from Paul Green-Armytage IN MEMORIAM – SHIGENOBU KOBAYASHI
Kobayashi was born in 1925 in Imabari, Japan, and graduated with a major in Electrical Engineering from Hiroshima College of Technology in 1947. He went on to study for a Master of Arts degree at Waseda University in Tokyo, with a major in Psychology, which he completed in 1954. In 1955 he married Sumiko Binnaka. They had a daughter, Setsuko, and a son, Shigeharu. In addition to electrical engineering and psychology Kobayashi had a strong interest in art and design. During the 1960s he taught at Toyo Art School and in the Department of Architecture at Musashi Institute of Technology. In 1966 he founded the Nippon Color and Design Research Institute (NCD) where he developed the Hue and Tone System and the Color Image Scale for which he obtained a patent in 1982. Kobayashi was a regular participant at the congresses of the International Colour Association (AIC) from York in 1973 to Rochester in 2001. He had papers published in the proceedings of the intervening congresses: Troy, Berlin, Monte Carlo, Buenos Aires, Budapest and Kyoto. He was also active in the Color Science Association of Japan. He contributed papers at all their annual meetings, from 1988 to 2004, and was made an honorary member in 2002. In addition to his many conference papers, and writing alone or as co-author, Kobayashi published 38 books on topics related to psychology, aesthetics, art, architecture, design and visual communication, three of which have been translated into English. In 1981 his account of The Aim and Method of the Color Image Scale was published in the prestigious international journal Color Research and Application. Kobayashi had a particular connection with Western Australia. I had the good fortune to meet him at the AIC congress in Buenos Aires where he explained his Color Image Scale to me in some detail. His ideas were the inspiration for a number of exercises explored by students of design at Curtin University and the Central School of Art and Design in Perth. Wendy Alford, who taught interior design at the Central School, found that her students enjoyed working with the Color Image Scale and could see how it could be applied in their work. Ruth Marrion, who obtained her Master’s degree in Design at Curtin University, has found it to be a particularly useful framework for her on-going investigation of personal colour preferences. My own students at Curtin looked at type faces, textures and different materials in relation to the Color Image Scale and I sent slides of the collages they produced to Mr Kobayashi. After attending the 1997 AIC Congress in Kyoto, Ruth Marrion and I travelled to Tokyo to visit Mr Kobayashi at the NCD Research Institute. There we saw how he had used a light box to represent the map of the Color Image Scale and how he had grouped the slides of my students’ work that I had sent him. We also had first hand experience of how a client might benefit from the services of the Institute and how the Color Image Scale can be used by individuals and organisations for marketing and to communicate ideas.
Our correspondence continued after my return to Western Australia as I sent more examples of student work and he replied with helpful comments. In 1999 Kobayashi decided that correspondence was too slow and he came to Perth for a week in October. With first year student Jun Hashizume acting as interpreter, Kobayashi gave a presentation to members of the Colour Society of Australia and a lecture to students at Curtin University. He also participated in student activities. He was a guest at a ‘colour lunch’ organised by Janelle Cugley with her students of Interior Architecture and he was able to give constructive criticism to the students of design. The students had made prototype bags for imaginary shops with names such as Extroverts, The Fairy Grotto and The Cybershop. The designs were to communicate appropriate images. It was striking how the most successful designs found their place on the scale in positions corresponding with appropriate image words such as ‘flamboyant’ and ‘lively’ for Extroverts, ‘delicate’ and ‘feminine’ for The Fairy Grotto and ‘rational’ and ‘precise’ for The Cybershop. Students were not introduced to the Color Image Scale before this project and it was only afterwards that we could see how closely our results corresponded with those obtained in Japan. This confirmed the value of the Color Image Scale as a tool for design.
The Color Image Scale continues to have a place in colour courses conducted in Western Australia. That is part of Kobayashi’s legacy to us. He also left us some of his superbly designed posters, which illustrate his system, as well as vivid memories of his visit. He had admirers and friends in Western Australia and we would like to send our condolences to his family, friends and colleagues in Japan. Paul Green-Armytage Colour Society of Australia mail@coloursociety.org.au. Enjoy your visit to the website of The Colour Society of Australia. Your comments on this website are most welcome. Please email us at |
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