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 Kew · The ultimate in controlled habitat-imitation
In Paris · ‘The Delirious Museum’
At Somerset House · Islamic art
In the Physic Garden · Peter Campbell in Chelsea
At the Royal Academy · Matisse’s revelations
At Dulwich Picture Gallery · David Wilkie
At the Hayward and the British Museum · With Goya and Rembrandt
At the Wallace Collection · Osbert Lancaster’s Promontory
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