Art show celebrates red

A new art show illuminates the historical significance of the color red. Seeing Red at the North Carolina Museum of Art features ancient artifacts whose red hues have been “preserved against all odds,” Artnet wrote, including an Egyptian jar from 4000 to 3500 B.C. — the exhibit’s oldest item. “Humans have been using red pigments and dyes for almost two million years,” the museum’s conservation director said: Ancient Romans used the pigment on their military gear, and red dominated cave paintings in Asia and Australia. While the shade is commonly used to depict emotions like passion or anger, the most universal association of red is with blood, the director said, “and by extension, life, death and the spirit world.”