In Vibrant Color

Louis Armstrong

Today, with our glossy magazines, large HD TV screens, and high-resolution iPhones and iPads, we are used to seeing our celebrities in full color. But, of course, this wasn't always the case. In the mid-1930s, most people had never encountered a color photograph, much less a color film. Harry Warnecke changed that with his revolutionary photographs for The New York Daily News,  New York’s first tabloid. The Sunday paper featured Warnecke’s brilliantly colored prints of beloved celebrities as they had never been seen before.

Now, 24 of these photographs from the 1930s and ’40s line the walls of the National Portrait Gallery, creating an exhibit entitled In Vibrant Color: Vintage Celebrity Portraits from the Harry Warnecke Studio, which is running until Sept. 9. 

Lucille Ball

You can see Lucille Ball's blazing red hair. And speaking of red, you can see that famed Boston Red Sox hitter Ted Williams actually did wear red socks. Ball and Williams are joined by many other of the biggest stars of the era. General George Patton is there. Laurel and Hardy are there. There is even a young Orson Welles.


Cowboys (and cowgirls) are often thought of in terms of white (hats) and black (hats).  And a more colorful wild west is represented in the show with full-color portraits of Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, and Dale Evans.


At first, the exhibition can be somewhat unsettling to those who grew up in the black and white only American times. The celebrities just don't look right.The best way to describe the effect is the sensory contrast between the opening black and white scenes of The Wizard of Oz with the burst of color that explodes on screen when Dorothy and her home plummet to Munchkin Land. For the record, that film debuted in 1939 and ushered in the color era. By the mid 1960s, almost all the rainbows were in color.

Tales, Tidbits, and Tips
Two of our nation's greatest newspapers are The New York Times and The Washington Post. Both battle for journalistic supremacy and often cover the same events in DC. Here you can compare the 2 papers coverage of In Vibrant Color. Click here to see The Times review of the exhibition. Click here to check out The Post review.