A Brazilian photographer with an ongoing project wants to take a new look at race. Skin doesn't come in black, white or brown; it comes in a gradient of tones ranging from dark to light.
Angélica Dass photographed volunteers from Rio de Janeiro to Paris for her project, Humanæ, but she's far from finished.
On her Tumblr, Dass refers to her project as a “work in progress.”
Dass puts out calls for volunteers of all skin colors.
They pose with minimal makeup or styling.
After capturing their images, Dass creates 11-by-11 pixel color samples from the photographs.
She matches them against the Pantone color library, searching for exact labels for the shades.
Dass labels each image with the number of the hue.
Finally, she sets the portrait on a background dyed that color.
Then, it's time for the next subject.
Dass calls her project "a chromatic inventory.”
It enables viewers to recognize the gradients in race and color.
Each time Dass displays her human color scale in public, the collection of images is a little more nuanced.
She plans to continue working until she's captured every skin tone possible.
All of us, no matter the skin color, are included in a universal color spectrum.
Thanks to Dass, art fans can see skin in a new light.
She represents a global palette.
It's a little food for thought.
Citations: Brazilian Photographer Attempts to Catalog All Possible Human Skin Tones (Good Magazine)
