Susan D. Murray

This project investigates the commercial, scientific, and cultural discourses through which the technology and perception of electronic color took shape from the 1920s through the 1960s, and in doing so, positions color television as central to the broader history of twentieth century visual culture. It argues that the development of color television was the first deliberate attempt at developing an advanced aesthetics for television and that color technology was a site of great anxiety and tension for the industry—not just in terms of who would ultimately win the "color war," but more essentially than that, over what television was supposed to do and to be.