Antal Nemcsics

From Hungary

I was informed today that Professor Antal Nemcsics passed away on 12th July 2019. He was 92 year old.

Kind regards, János Zana - A member of the Hungarian National Colour Committee

Expressions of Condolences

From US

I am sad to hear of Antal Nemcsics' passing, but he had said he was not well. I first met Prof. Nemcsics at the AIC meeting in Budapest in 1993, and needless to say I have been in touch with him throughout the years. He continued to publish articles in Color Research and Application even to the issue that just came out, August 2019 (Vol 44#4), is which he has "Change in colour preference in 50 years duration and its dependence on age." The color community will miss him very much.

Ellen C. Carter Editor, Color Research and Application

From Portugal

Sad news---the passing of such an extraordinarily sensitive and intelligent human being. Thank you for informing us with the memory of his life contributions to colour and the colour community.

Prof. Doutora Maria João Durão Faculdade de Arquitectura da Universidade de Lisboa

From Brazil

I'm so sorry. Irreparable loss.

Imara Duarte Designer, University Federal of Campina Grande-UFCG

From Australia

On behalf of the President, our National Executive, and the Membership of the Colour Society of Australia, may we forward our condolences to the Hungarian National Colour Committee on their loss, and comment that so many notable achievements are always hard acts to follow in our world of Colour but set the standards for us all.

Glenys Thomson National Secretary, Colour Society of Australia

From France

J'aimerais rendre hommage à Antal Nemcsics, que j'ai bien connu dès 1969... Et nous avons eu bien des échanges ! C'était une personnalité très attachante, joignant parfaitement l'art et la science. Je pense que son apport fut assez considérable, pour avoir sû incorporer les couleurs matérielles au sein du fer à cheval de l'AIC. De plus il faut rendre hommage à son talent d'organisateur, avec l'organisation de ses fructueuses rencontres sur la Dynamique et l'Harmonie des couleurs.

Michel Albert-Vanel Professor Emeritus École nationale supérieure des Arts Décoratifs (EnsAD), Paris

From China

It's really a painful news! I read Antal's book on Color Dynamics and some of his articles in the journal Color Research and Application. He enlightened me a lot. He is a great man worthy of our worship and memory. I will always miss him.

Aiping Gou Ecology Institute, Shanghai Institute of Technology, Shanghai

From Brazil

Very sad news. My deep feelings for the family and the Hungarian colour colleagues.

Prof. Dr. Paula Csillag Dept. Design ESPM University President, Brazilian Colour Association

From US

Sorry to hear, but happily he seemed to have lived a full life and accomplished so much.

I was both honoured by and very much enjoyed meeting him. First was when he came to my Cyclorama exhibit in Budapest in 2002.

He loved the work and brought many colleagues to see it. It was at that time I first met Istvan Haaz.

When I returned a few years later for the color conference we both attended, I had a wonderful lunch with him. He brought along his granddaughter to translate. He honored me with a copy of his book on the Coloroid System. We had a delightful time. I also saw a beautiful show of his paintings.

I often thought about him. He managed to live a life thinking and experiencing the beautiful during an era in Hungary that seldom seemed to foster peace and happiness. An admirable life by a good man.

Thanks for writing. Sanford Wurmfeld Professor Emeritus Department of Art, Hunter College, New York City, NY

in memoriam

Antal Nemcsics dies July 12, 2019, aged 92

We will always remember his scientific work, his paintings, his contribution to the AIC. He was the founder of the AIC Study Group on Environmental Colour Design.

Antal Nemcsics (1927–2019) in front of one of his paintings, Budapest, 2012. Photo: Verena M. Schindler

In 2017, the AIC CADE Award honoured the work of Antal Nemcsics (1927–2019), artist, researcher, colour scientist, and professor, with a PhD in architectural sciences and a D.Sc. in colour sciences. He was Chair of the Hungarian National Colour Committee during the period 1969–2015. He obtained the International Giorgione Award (Venice) and the International Award for Colour in Environmental Design (Stuttgart). He is author of the Coloroid System, conceived on harmony thresholds. His book Colour Dynamics. Environmental Colour Design (New York: Ellis Horwood, 1993) is used as a textbook in universities worldwide. He had more than 100 colour design realizations for buildings and interior spaces, including the colour design for the Ferenc Lizst Airport, the Metropolitan Railway, and the Castle District in Budapest.

A crucial event securing the significance of the topic of colour in the built environment was the AIC 1976 Interim Meeting “Colour Dynamics” held June 8–11, 1976, in Budapest. This meeting was organized by the Hungarian National Colour Committee and Professor Antal Nemcsics was a member of the organizing as well as scientific committees of this important event.

Antal Nemcsics’ initiative in 1981 to create a study group on colour dynamics within the International Colour Association (AIC) attracted much interest. The study group was consolidated under the name Environmental Colour Design (ECD) at the AIC 1982 Interim Meeting “Colour Dynamics” held June 8–10, 1982, in Budapest.

During the period 1990–1993, Professor Antal Nemcsics served the AIC as a member of the Executive Committee. Among the many activities of the Hungarian National Colour Committee an important international event was the organization of the Seventh Congress of the International Colour Association, June 13–18, 1993, in Budapest.

Some years later the International Conference on Colour Harmony was held in Budapest on April 24–26, 2007. I had the great pleasure of attending the conference and also visiting Professor Antal Nemcsics in his wonderful studio.

The fifth International Conference of Colour Specialists held in Hungary was the International Interdisciplinary Conference on Colour and Pattern Harmony, June 11–13, 2012, at Óbuda University in Budapest where I had the chance to meet him again.

From 2007 to 2014, he published a series of articles on colour harmony in the journal Color Research and Application, the last two ones together with Jenõ Takács. His last contribution in the same professional journal was on "Change in colour preference in 50 years duration and its dependence on age" that will be published in August 2019, Vol. 44, #4.

Antal Nemcsics will be greatly missed by the international colour community.

Verena M. Schindler

selected bibliography

books

Nemcsics, A. (1985), Coloroid Colour Atlas. Budapest: Innofinance.
Nemcsics, A. (1993), Axial and Coaxial Orders. Budapest: Vasarely Museum.
Nemcsics, A. (1993), Colour and Architecture. Budapest: Budapest Gallery.
Nemcsics, A. (1993), Farbenlehre und Farbendynamik. Theorie der farbigen Umweltplanung. (German Edition) Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó. [English Edition: Colour Dynamics: Environmental Colour Design. New York, NY: Ellis Horwood.]
Nemcsics, A. (1996), Színország törvényei [The Laws of Colourland]. Budapest: Vigadó Gallery.
Nemcsics, A. (2000), Coloroid Colour Atlas, Budapest.
Nemcsics, A. (2001), Színország törvényei 2. Különbözö történelmi korok építészeti stílusainak színhasználata [The Laws of Colourland 2. The Use of Colour in Architectural Styles of Different Historical Epochs], Budapest.
Nemcsics, A. (2002), Színország törvényei 3. Színek és muráliák a különbözö funkciójú terekben [The Laws of Colourland 3. Colours and Murals. Different Functional Spaces], Budapest.
Nemcsics, A. (2003), The Laws of Colourland 4. Colour Harmony and the Visual Message, Budapest.
Nemcsics, A. (2007), Utazásaim színországban [Travels to Colourland], Veszprém-Budapest: Magyar Képek Kft.

articles in Color Research and Application

Nemcsics, A. (1980), The coloroid color system. Color Res. Appl., 5: 113–120. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.5080050214
Nemcsics, A. (1987), Color space of the coloroid color system. Color Res. Appl., 12: 135–146. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.5080120307
Nemcsics, A. (1994), Spacing in the Munsell Color System Relative to the Coloroid Color Systems. Color Res. Appl., 19: 122–125. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1520-6378.1994.tb00071.x
Nemcsics, A. (2007), Experimental determination of laws of color harmony. Part 1: Harmony content of different scales with similar hue. Color Res. Appl., 32: 477–488. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.20357
Nemcsics, A. (2008), Experimental determination of laws of color harmony. Part 2: Harmony content of different monochrome color pairs. Color Res. Appl., 33: 262–270. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.20416
Nemcsics, A. (2009), Experimental determination of laws of color harmony. Part 3: Harmony content of different hue pairs. Color Res. Appl., 34: 33–44. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.20457
Nemcsics, A. (2009), Experimental determination of the laws of color harmony. Part 4: Color preference and the color harmony content. Color Res. Appl., 34: 210–224. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.20489
Nemcsics, A. (2011), Experimental determination of laws of color harmony. Part 5: The harmony content of the various hue triads. Color Res. Appl., 36: 127–139. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.20590
Nemcsics, A. (2012), Experimental determination of laws of color harmony. Part 6: Numerical index system of color harmony. Color Res. Appl., 37: 343–358. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.20700
Nemcsics, A. and Takács, J. (2013), Experimental determination of laws of color harmony. Part 7: Experiments carried out with eyes adapted to light and dark. Color Res. Appl., 38: 448–455. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.21752
Nemcsics, A. and Takács, J. (2014), Experimental determination of laws of color harmony. Part 8: Harmony content versus relative surface coverage. Color Res. Appl., 39: 387–398. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.21797
Nemcsics, A, Takács, J. (2017), Color characteristic of Castle District built on the hill. Color Res Appl., 42: 836–848. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.22139
Nemcsics, A, Takacs, J. (2019), Preference and harmony of neutral colours in 50‐year apart. Color Res Appl., 44: 98–105. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.22254
Nemcsics, A, Takács, J. (2019), Change in colour preference in 50 years duration and its dependence on age. Color Res Appl., 44: 622–629. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.22373

articles in books

Nemcsics, A. (1983), Budapest: the Coloroid System. The colour scheme of the Buda Castle District. The Colour of the City, edited by Ed Taverne and Cor Wagenaar, Laren: V+K Publishing, 56–67.

conference papers

Nemcsics, A. (1965), Bestimmung von Farbpräferenz-Indexwerten für farbige Raumgestaltung. Proceedings of the International Colour Meeting, Lucerne, Switzerland, June 1–4, 1965, Vol. 2: 957–964.
Nemcsics, A. (1969), Préférence de couleurs chez l’homme dans les différentes époques historiques et aujourd’hui. Book of Abstracts Color, 69, First Congress of the AIC, Stockholm, Sweden, June 9–13, 1969, Stockholm, 12:3.
Nemcsics, A. (1969), Valeurs d’indice de la préférence de couleurs et formation de locaux colorés. Book of Abstracts, Color 69, First Congress of the AIC, Stockholm, Sweden, June 9–13, 1969, Stockholm, 12:4.
Nemcsics, A. (1973), Colour System for Colour Spaces. Proceedings of Colour 73, Second Congress of the AIC, University of York, England, July 2–6, 1973. London: Adam Hilger, 522-526.
Nemcsics, A. (1976), The Theoretical and Experimental Exploration of the Relationship between Man, Colour and the Environment. Proceedings of Colour Dynamics, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Budapest, Hungary, June 8–11, 1976: 12-30.
Fehér, Mihály, Antal Nemcsics and Árpád Alföldy (1976), The Influence of Coloured Environment on Various Physiological and Pathophysiological Parameters. Proceedings of Colour Dynamics, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Budapest, Hungary, June 8–11, 1976: 236–240.
Nemcsics, A. (1976), The Szinoid Colorimeter: An Instrument for Measurement and Finding Harmony for Colour Dynamical Purposes. Proceedings of Colour Dynamics, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Budapest, Hungary, June 8–11, 1976: 392–396.
Nemcsics, A. (1976), The Course on Colour Dynamics at the Faculty for Architecture of the Technical University of Budapest. Proceedings of Colour Dynamics, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Budapest, Hungary, June 8–11, 1976: 454–460.
Holvay, Endre, Antal Nemcsics and Mihály Fehér (1976), The Task of Colour Dynamics in Hygienic Institutions. Proceedings of Colour Dynamics, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Budapest, Hungary, June 8–11, 1976: 513–515.
Alföldy, Árpád, Mihály Fehér and Antal Nemcsics (1976), The Role of the Coloured Environment in Diagnostics and Therapy. Proceedings of Colour Dynamics, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Budapest, Hungary, June 8–11, 1976: 522–526.
Nemcsics, A. (1977), Indexes for Describing the Perception of Modification of Space Linked to the Coordinates of the Coloroid Colour System. Proceedings of Color 77, Third Congress of the AIC, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York, July 10–15, 1977. Bristol: Adam Hilger: 406–410.
Nemcsics, Antal, Elek Béres and Rudolf Postási (1977), Marking of Colours in the Coloroid Colour System. Proceedings of Color 77, Third Congress of the AIC, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York, July 10-15, 1977. Bristol: Adam Hilger: 523.
Nemcsics, A. (1981), Colour in Architecture and Industrial Design. The Coloroid Colour System. Proceedings of AIC Color 81, Fourth Congress of the AIC, Berlin, Germany, September 21–25, 1981: 62–83.
Nemcsics, A. (1981), Farbenharmonie – Versuche. Proceedings of AIC Color 81, Fourth Congress of the AIC, Berlin, Germany, September 21–25, 1981: 267–272.
Nemcsics, A. (1982), Colour Harmony in Architectural Space. Proceedings of Colour Dynamics, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Budapest, Hungary, June 8–10, 1982: 23–33.
Nemcsics, A. (1983), Various Concepts of the Sensibly Even Colour Space. Proceedings of Forsius Symposium Colour Order Systems, Midterm Meeting of the AIC, Kungälv, Sweden, August 25–28, 1983: 19:1–5.
Nemcsics, A. (1984), Colour Harmonies. Proceedings of Colour Education, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Salamanca, Spain, June 18–20, 1984: 67–69.
Nemcsics, A. (1984), Coding of Colours. Proceedings of Colour Education, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Salamanca, Spain, June 18–20, 1984: 70–72.
Nemcsics, A. (1984), Colour Education in Hungary. Proceedings of Colour Education, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Salamanca, Spain, June 18–20, 1984.
Nemcsics, A. (1985), Questions théoriques et pratiques du système de couleurs Coloroid. Proceedings of Mondial Couleur 85, Fifth Congress of the AIC, Monte Carlo, Monaco, June 16–22, 1985, Paper 8 (6 pages).
Nemcsics, A. (1988), The Coloroid Colour System and Atlas. Proceedings of Colour in Environmental Colour Design, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Winterthur Polytechnic, Winterthur, Switzerland, August 7–11, 1988, Paper 15 (5 pages).
Nemcsics, A. (1989), Comparison Between Coloroid, Munsell, DIN, NCS Colour Spaces. Proceedings of AIC Color 89, Sixth Congress of the AIC, Buenos Aires, Argentina, March 12–17, 1989, Vol. 2: 103–106.
Nemcsics, A. (1990), Colour System ‘Coloroid’. Proceedings of Colour for Towns, International Seminar, Moscow, May 22–25: 240–251.
Nemcsics, A. (1991), Coloroid Colour Harmonies at the Budapest Underground Railways. Proceedings of Colour & Light 91, Midterm Meeting of the AIC, Sydney, Australia, June 25–28, 1991: 127–129.
Nemcsics, A. (1991), Colourland’s Law. Proceedings of Colour & Light 91, Midterm Meeting of the AIC, Sydney, Australia, June 25–28, 1991: 127–129.
Nemcsics, A. (1992), Colour Space Relying on Harmony Treshold Measurements. Proceedings of Computer Color Formulation, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Princeton, N.J., USA, June 21–24, 1992.
Nemcsics, A. (1992), Colour Space Relying on Harmony Treshold Measurements. Proceedings of Computer Color Formulation, Interim Meeting of the AIC, Princeton, N.J., USA, June 21–24, 1992.
Nemcsics, A. (1993), Colour and Order. Proceedings of the Seventh Congress of the AIC, Budapest, Hungary, June 13–18, 1993, paper 14:1–12.
Nemcsics, A. (1997), Colourland’s Law. Proceedings of AIC Color 97, Eighth Congress of the AIC, Kyoto, Japan, May 25–30, 1997: 703–706.
Nemcsics, A. (1997), Colour Dynamics as a New Science. Proceedings of AIC Color 97, Eighth Congress of the AIC, Kyoto, Japan, May 25–30, 1997: 707–710.
Nemcsics, A. (2001), Recent Experiments Investigating the Harmony Interval Based Colour Space of the Coloroid Colour System. Proceedings of AIC Color 01, Ninth Congress of the AIC, Rochester, USA, June 24–29, 2001, SPIE Vol. 4421: 865–868.
Nemcsics, A. (2005), Experimental Revealing of Harmony Correlations Definable within the Colour Space of Coloroid Colour System. Proceedings of AIC Color 05, Tenth Congress of the AIC, Granada, Spain, May 8–13, 2005, Vol. 2.: 1391–1394.
Neumann L., Antal Nemcsics and A. Neumann (2005), Quantitative Dichromatic Color Harmony Rules Based on Coloroid System. Proceedings of AIC Color 05, Tenth Congress of the AIC, Granada, Spain, May 8–13, 2005, Vol. 2.: 1573–1576.

articles on Antal Nemcsics

Billmeyer, F. W. (1987), Survey of color order systems. Color Res. Appl., 12: 173–186. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.5080120405
Smith, N. S., Whitfield, T. W. A. and Wiltshire, T. J. (1990), Comparison of the munsell, NCS, DIN, and coloroid colour order systems using the OSA-UCS model. Color Res. Appl., 15: 327–337. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.5080150607
Smith, N. S. (1993), Colorcurve and coloroid notations for the OSA‐UCS atlas samples. Color Res. Appl., 18: 114-122. doi:10.1002/col.5080180208
Billmeyer, F. W. (1994), Colour Dynamics: Environmental Colour Design, by Antal Nemcsics, Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest, Hungary, 1993. Translated from the Hungarian by Mrs. G. Nagy. 360 pp. + 96 color illustrations, $101.95. Color Res. Appl., 19: 310–311. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.5080190411
Burchett, K. (2005), Colour Harmony and the Visual Message (Book review). Color Res. Appl., 30: 243. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.20111
Caivano, J. L. (2006), Research on color in architecture and environmental design: Brief history, current developments, and possible future. Color Res. Appl., 31: 350–363. https://doi.org/10.1002/col.20224
Hirschler, R. (2008), Book review. [My Travels in the Realm of Colors, in Hungarian, by Antal Nemcsics.] Color Res. Appl., 33: 254–256.https://doi.org/10.1002/col.20412

Verena M. Schindler