'What Colour Was The Cold War'

Abstract

What constitutes museum experts’ foundational knowledge and presumptions about the Cold War? This chapter builds on ethnographic curiosity about colour in museum settings to answer this question. Colours are a useful lens onto personal and institutional perceptions as well as preconceptions. The act of being asked to call a colour to mind that represented the past was an important indicator of how professionals envisaged the Cold War in museums – infused with cultural references, nostalgia, highly specialised knowledge and sometimes personal memories. The chapter argues that given that the public space of a museum is always coloured, one way or another, and given that we all recognise the symbolic attributes of colour, a consideration of how it informs collections, displays and institutional narratives of the Cold War can enhance museum practice.