After the Deluge 
Peter Campbell
- The Rainbow Bridge: Rainbows in Art, Myth and Science by Raymond Lee and Alistair Fraser
First the rainbow brought messages, later it demanded explanations. In the story of Noah it is God’s promise of an end to floods; in Greek mythology, Iris was both goddess of the rainbow and the messenger of the gods. Then, once a scientific theory was called for, it proved far from easy to come up with a satisfactory one.
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Peter Campbell is the London Review’s resident designer and art critic.
Other articles by this contributor:
At the British Museum · John White’s New World
At the Hayward · Alexander Rodchenko
At the Royal Academy · How to Draw Horses
At the British Museum · Medical Curiosities
Global Moods · Art, Past and Present
At Tate Modern · Like a badly iced cake
At the National Portrait Gallery · fashion photography
In Bexhill · Ben Nicholson