The addition of black makes the white whiter.

July 15, 2023 8:17 PM

Have you read Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison? I recommend it, and am grateful to the professor who assigned in in an American Lit. class. The protagonist works at a paint factory. "To achieve Liberty Paints' Optic White color, the narrator must add drops of a dark black mixture to an original dull gray substance. When the paint batch is mixed properly, the results are a glowing, bright white color. The symbolism in Liberty Paints' signature color represents the importance black individuals play in America's past, present and future. It's only when black is added to the paint mix that the purest, most ideal, paint color emerges." Someone has invented an extremely white paint and I hope they read Invisible Man.

I read about the white paint on Kottke, and immediately thought about Invisible Man. The post is an odd juxtaposition if you haven't read it.

posted by theora55 (17 comments total)

I read this post and immediately thought about Clarance Thomas' movement from Black Panther radical to conservative sheep after the white man started affording him opportunities. YMMV.
posted by hippybear at 8:33 PM on July 15, 2023 [6 favorites]

nobody tell Anish Kapoor
posted by Greg_Ace at 8:37 PM on July 15, 2023 [14 favorites]

Just read about that whitest white paint as well, and also have Invisible Man on my next to read list...
posted by blue shadows at 11:13 PM on July 15, 2023 [1 favorite]

Archive link.
posted by Silvery Fish at 2:40 AM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

Invisible Man is well worth a read. It’s a rush of story, by turns realistic, surreal, absurd, angry, desperate, populated by characters who are often grotesque but precisely described and memorable. It’s grueling, a litany of absurd heaped on the unnamed narrator as he is denied agency, respect, and personhood at every new situation. There is some humor in all the anger, some rest in the carnage of this man’s life, but it’s mostly relentless. If that doesn’t sound appealing, it’s also vivid and intensely descriptive of time and place, and it’s not like the narrator hasn’t earned his anger.

It’s a bit of a climb and not short, but the episodic nature means you can tackle it in pieces, if that works for you.
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:59 AM on July 16, 2023 [9 favorites]

I don’t have any real opinion about the paint.
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:00 AM on July 16, 2023 [5 favorites]

I just listened to a podcast partially about Ralph Ellison, who I’d never heard of before: The last archive - Unheard
posted by fizban at 4:35 AM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

I think sheep is 100% the wrong word to describe Thomas.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:23 AM on July 16, 2023 [6 favorites]

My beloved and late African-American tutor, the brilliant Mary Ellison (Welsh, blonde, no relation) had this on our reading list from the get-go but I never finished it under after my degree and then added that to the giant pile of regrets to be blown up in a boiler room.

An utterly fabulous novel which I now need to dig out from my many boxes.

But a tenuous, if not undetectable link between the white paint and Invisible Man, as glad as I am to be reminded of the book.
posted by bookbook at 6:40 AM on July 16, 2023 [4 favorites]

then added that to the giant pile of regrets to be blown up in a boiler room

Which is, surprisingly, a fair summary of part of the novel.
posted by GenjiandProust at 8:05 AM on July 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

I remember learning about this book accidentally when growing up. An sf fan, I would mention Wells' _The Invisible Man_, and more people knew the Ellison title than the one I referred to.
posted by doctornemo at 8:51 AM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

Ok I know this post isn’t really entirely about paint technology but it reminded me of this neat video I watched the other day: making infrared cooling paint from grocery store items
posted by qxntpqbbbqxl at 9:31 AM on July 16, 2023

> a rush of story, by turns realistic, surreal, absurd

Invisible Man was such a masterpiece, as the reader proceeds through the narrator’s experience of Blackness in the United States the author takes us through a survey of American literary styles, that Ellison struggled to match it in his lifetime. Juneteenth was published posthumously. Absolutely agree with Genji-Proust it’s worth the read.
posted by rubatan at 10:53 AM on July 16, 2023 [4 favorites]

nobody tell Anish Kapoor

Vantablack
Vannawhite
posted by ActingTheGoat at 11:08 AM on July 16, 2023 [6 favorites]

This Making Infrared Cooling Paint From Grocery Store Items?
posted by kirkaracha at 11:31 AM on July 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

This was assigned summer reading In my AP English class and boy was I not prepared. Knowing what I know now about the author and New York City politics in the 1960s it makes a lot more sense. But it’s definitely not a read “five books in a week and write a report on each” kind of book.
posted by pwnguin at 3:30 PM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

Someone has invented an extremely white paint

Previously.

and I hope they read Invisible Man.

Half the authors on the original paper are affiliated with research labs in mainland China. I'm gonna go out on a limb and assume they don't have access to a book that is openly critical of Communist Party behavior.
posted by pwnguin at 9:46 AM on July 17, 2023