revealing

reveal (one's) (true) colors

To reveal what one really believes, thinks, or wants; to act in accordance with one's real personality, character, or disposition. Primarily heard in US. Dave said all along that he only wanted this deal because it was in the company's best interest, but he revealed his true colors once he realized that he wouldn't get any special commission for his efforts. It's only in times of crisis that your friends will really reveal their colors.
See also: color, reveal

reveal (one's) (true) stripes

To reveal what one really believes, thinks, or wants; to act in accordance with one's real personality, character, or disposition. (A less common variant of "show one's (true) colors.") Dave said all along that he only wanted this deal because it was in the company's best interest, but he revealed his true stripes once he realized that he wouldn't get any special commission for his efforts. It's only in times of crisis that your friends will really reveal their stripes.
See also: reveal, stripe

reveal (one's) cards

To make one's plans, intentions, ideas, or resources known to others, especially those that were previously hidden or kept secret. (Also expressed as "reveal (one's) hand"; both phrases refer to displaying one's cards ("hand") during a card game.) In business negotiations, it's important that you don't reveal your cards right away, or you might risk losing out on the best deal possible. Pressure from the government is forcing the notoriously secretive CEO to reveal his cards regarding his company's tax profile and offshore accounts.
See also: card, reveal

reveal (one's) hand

To make one's plans, intentions, ideas, or resources known to others, especially those that were previously hidden or kept secret. (Also expressed as "reveal (one's) cards"; both phrases refer to displaying one's cards ("hand") during a card game.) In business negotiations, it's important that you don't reveal your hand right away, or you might risk losing out on the best deal possible. Pressure from the government is forcing the notoriously secretive CEO to reveal his hand regarding his company's tax profile and offshore accounts.
See also: hand, reveal

reveal to (someone or something)

1. To disclose, divulge, or make known something to someone or some group. A noun or pronoun is used between "reveal" and "to." I revealed my new strategy to the board of directors, but they weren't nearly as receptive to it as I'd hoped. A magician should never reveal her secrets to anyone.
2. To show or display some concealed person or thing to someone or some group; to expose someone or something to the view of another person or group. A noun or pronoun is used between "reveal" and "to." The film never reveals the killer to the you, instead allowing you to draw your own conclusions. He pulled back the curtain and revealed the new product to the excited audience. The masked vigilante promised to reveal himself to the public once the city's crime rate was under control.
See also: reveal
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.
See also:
  • reveal (one's) (true) colors
  • show your colours
  • show your true colours
  • show (one's) (true) colours
  • show (one's) (true) stripes
  • reveal (one's) (true) stripes
  • show (one's) (true) colors
  • show colors
  • show one's colors
  • show one's true colors
References in periodicals archive
In "Form and Transformation," Harrison analyzes the Okra (soul) of the Second Line, Ring Shout, Shiny Man, and Spiritual-Blues, revealing the sacredness of all Africana art and the divinity and dexterity of Africana artists: "We play the changes, making those improvisations that aspire toward a reconciliation between the visible and invisible, adorning the appropriate masks for secular and sacred performances that will invoke the ancestral spirit."
Paul Carter Harrison, Victor Leo Walker, II, and Gus Edwards, eds. Black Theatre: Ritual Performance in the African Diaspora
Although we remain largely in the dark regarding the peasants on the great estates east of the Elbe, this book, in conjunction with Sabean's study of Neckarhausen, provides an extremely revealing portrait of two of the three basic regional variants of German peasant society.
Lebenslaufe, Familien, Hofe: Die Bauern und Heuerleute des Osnabruckischen Kirchspiels Belm in proto-industrieller Zeit, 1650-1860
I found one sequence particularly revealing. Philip Hoffman shot Snow's photographic series for the Group of Seven's paintings on display, entitled Plus Tard.
Experimental (films): (Brownsnow)
Collins advises us that Revelation "also has a theological point, which is to say that God is revealing to us through this prophet John what is to be.
Apocalypse now
HOLES IN HISTORY In another example of archaeological techniques revealing World War II history, Lawrence E.
Seeing past the dirt: using ground-penetrating radar to focus archaeological digs
Hitching up her skirts to keep them dry, she inadvertently exposed her hairy legs, thus revealing the telltale mark of a genie.
Nothing there: the art and science of transparency is evolving from Modernism's preoccupation with light and lightness to intelligent skins
These students deem research courses to be the most difficult in their programs of study, often revealing that they would not have enrolled in these classes if they had not been required to do so (Wilson & Onwuegbuzie, in press).
Research attitudes of African-American graduate students
Nevertheless, these writings--comprising dramatic pieces, essays, and short stories, as well as about forty poems--hold great interest, revealing a Dunbar with whom scholars have not been entirely familiar.
Herbert Woodward Martin and Ronald Primeau, eds. In His Own Voice: The Dramatic and Other Uncollected Works of Paul Laurence Dunbar
On one hand, her installation is an instance of Conceptually based institutional critique, in which the goal of producing aesthetic objects is superseded by that of revealing the power structures that produce aesthetic value.
Elaine Reichek
The book is at its best when revealing how stylistically disparate works derive their forms from debates over the same set of events.
Lines of Authority: Politics and English Literary Culture, 1649-1689
The jury was impressed by the brave and revealing intervention into a very complex urban fabric, which has been accomplished with pretty slender means.
Curving into the past: a bold initiative in Ljubljana's delicate core links past, present and future in space
DISR's visible-light and infrared spectrometers will analyze the feeble sunlight reflected from the surface of Titan back through its atmosphere, revealing the composition of clouds and the size of aerosol particles.
A titan of a mission: parachuting through smog to Saturn's moon
Gayle's only criticism of Jones, presented in revealing sexual language, is that he accepts the "right of society to castrate him" because he adheres to some "superficial values, as readily, though not as completely, as the Harrisons" (185):
Love Jones: a black male feminist critique of Chester Himes's If He Hollers Let Him Go
Unfortunately, though, the thrust of recent social history has called this argument into question by revealing the continued power and prosperity of the nobility in early modern France (see, for example, James B.
1592-1992: recent French works on the Renaissance
The evidence comes from an infrared survey of 266 youthful stars, revealing that 71 of them have disks of dusty debris.
Messy findings: planets encounter a violent world