Burnt Umber 

Editor: This is "Burnt Umber," made by Winsor & Newton. It is a simple bottle of pigment. It makes me think of alchemy, something elemental and earthy. What symbols or cultural associations arise for you? Curator: The colour itself is a cultural artefact, isn't it? Umber, like ochre, carries deep symbolic weight. Think of cave paintings, early renderings of the human form, of animals. What primal narratives emerge for you when you see this earthen tone? Editor: I'm struck by its origins in the earth, now contained in a manufactured bottle. It feels like a loss of connection. Curator: Precisely. It speaks to a cultural memory, doesn't it? The tension between raw material and industrial form. What does that tension evoke for you? Editor: A sense of longing, maybe. A disconnect from the origins of art itself. It's simple, but profound.