Color Circles 5

4 Lovibond 1915 Wilson 1905 Lacouture 1890 Babbitt 1878 Runge 1810 Grassmann 1853 Field 1877 Rood 1879 Itten 1944 Forsius 1611 Gregoire 1820 Newton 1704 Bourges 1918 Birren 1934 Hering 1878 Munsell 1905 NCS-SYSTEM 1979 Bezold 1874 Irozu-Mondou 1876 Kupka 1910 Color Circles 5 Runge 1810 Jacobs 1923 Raskin 1825 Bacon 1866 Hayter 1830 Color Circles Kunihiko Sugiyama Who invented color circles? Chevreul 1861 Wundt 1874 Ostwald 1917 Color circles are diagrams that graphically express the concept of color. Various styles have been used since ancient times, but circular and spherical diagrams are the most common. The first step is to consider the simple question: “Why is color expressed using geometric conceptual schemes such as circular diagrams?” When arranged side by side, we see 3,000 years of color culture history. © DWH Co., LTD. Hübl 1904 Author unknown 1708 Goethe 1810 Ziegler 1850 Bezold 1876 Herschel 1817 Itten 1944 6 avoid being scooped, resulting in sense of color in ancient times: introduction The origins of Wallace sometimes being referred “ The colour of grass and foliage the sense of color to as the “man eclipsed by Darwin.” is never alluded to as a beauty in the Looking at the large number of color One of his works, Tropical Nature, Vedas or the Zendavesta, though these system charts published in books The beginnings with eight colors and Other Essays (1878), includes productions are continually extolled on chromatics makes one wonder some interesting observations on for other properties. Blue is described why so many are circular, and which How did people in ancient the origins of the sense of color as by terms denoting sometimes green, individual might have devised the times conceive “color”? This is a a naturalist and biologist. While sometimes black, showing that it first color circles. question that has fascinated me for the passage is quite long, it is worth was hardily recognized as a distinct a long time. The article “The people quoting here. colour. The colour of the sky is never This topic is touched on in the 2004 that deciphered the rainbow” in the “…It is quite possible that at first, mentioned in the Bible, the Vedas, Japanese language edition of this previous issue of this handbook was green and blue were the only kinds the Homeric poems, or even in the publication. related to this fascination of mine. A of light-vibrations which could be Koran. The first distinct allusion to look at the book entitled ClassiColor: perceived at all. When the need This time, we will use the results of it known to Geiger is in an Arabic Farven I Antik Skulptur allows one to for differentiation of colour arose, that analysis to study the key color work of the ninth century. …Aristotle see how ancient artists and craftsmen rays of greater and of smaller circles in chronological order. names three colours in the rainbow— used the color palette. wave-lengths would necessarily red, yellow and green. Two centuries According to American color be made use of to excite the new earlier Xenophanes had described researcher Faber Birren (1900-1988), the sensations required; and we can the rainbow as purple, reddish, and palettes used by artists in the 4,000 thus understand why green and yellow. The Pythagoreans admitted FIRE years from ancient times up until the blue form the central portion of four primary colours—white, black, Aristotle Renaissance consisted of only eight the visible spectrum, and are the red, and yellow; the Chinese the B.C.384–322, DRY ” Greece HOT primary colors. Of course, far more colours which are most agreeable to same, with the addition of green. EARTH colors are seen in the natural world, us in large surfaces; while at its two These suggest that a wide range of colors was in used in ancient AIR and this does not mean that ancient extremities we find yellow, red and people were not able to see a wide violet-colours we best appreciate in times, but barely described in WET range of colors. But it is believed smaller masses, and when contrasted writing. While there may have been Fig. 1: Diagram of a GOLD four-element, four- that there was no need to distinguish with the other two, or with natural fewer names for the modern-day property diagram between the wide range of colors tints. We have here probably the primary colors, historical works such that spread from WATER Greece to Arabia. The as today, and only a few colors had foundations of a natural theory as On Colors by Aristotle and The elementary colors are significant meaning. We see similar of harmonious colouring, derived Treatise on Color by Goethe indicate red, blue, yellow, and green. observations in the work of French from the order in which our colour- that many color names were in use color researcher Michel Pastoureau. sensations have arisen and the for flora and fauna. British naturalist and geographer nature of the emotions with which Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913) the several tints have been always conceived the theory of evolution associated.” before Charles Darwin, and wrote And also quoting from Zur his ideas in a letter to Darwin. This Entwickelungs-geschichte der prompted Darwin to rush his theory Menschheit (1871) by Lazarus Geiger Fig. 2: Eight-color ink well, from Color & Human Response by Faber Birren published in 1978. of evolution into publication to regarding the development of a Color Circles 7 Research into different colors (white, yellow, purple, included numerous contradictions. Mixture of light and color starting with green, blue, gray, and black), just as there Aristotle’s color theories were darkness theory are seven different types of flavor, refined and reassessed by the 11th Aristotle Aristotle’s explanations of color included with other colors being mixtures century Arabian scientist Alhazen, the explanation that the myriad of colors The first recorded in-depth studies of these seven. This concept was forming the basis of research on consisted of a mixture of light and darkness. into color in human history were known as the mixture of light and the structure of the eye and visual In his work Meteorology, Aristotle explains made by Aristotle and his students darkness theory. Elsewhere Aristotle perception theories resembling that “lines of sight became weaker when reflected, with dark objects becoming darker, (such as Theophrastus). A r istot le’s writes that gray is an intermediate those used to this day. These are and, white objects becoming blacker. He also theories on color and the visual color between black and white, and covered the Book of Optics. Little described how the color (white) of lines of sight sense continued to influence studies while arranging the white-gray- remains from the Middle Ages, became redder when stronger, greener when of color into the 19th century. It black axis vertically would form a but in the 14th century, Aristotle’s slightly weaker, and bluer when increasingly weaker.” While color is widely discussed is worthwhile to examine them color solid, the explanation was not visual perception theories were in many of Aristotle’s works, these are not in detail before discussing color developed quite that far. expanded in Opus Majus by Roger scientific theories, and minor disparities are circles. Aristotle’s color theories are Bacon, and perspectivists such as noticeable even within his works. The quote Aristotle’s studies of light and written mainly in On the Soul. Let us Nicole Oresme. above highlighted in blue can therefore be described as a common concept with the color are discussed in his works now move on to see how Aristotle’s Optics is the study of light, and mixture of light and darkness theory. So how De Anima (On the Soul), S e n s e color theories sub-sequently the foundations of color research then does the mixture of light and darkness and Sensibilia, On Colors, and developed in the world. that subsequently took off from theory differ from the transformation theory Meteorology. According to Aristotle, The theory of visual perception the 16th to 18th centuries with which states that white light is pure light and all colors such as red, blue, and yellow color is something visible in originating in Ancient Greece is the completion of principles of transform according to the degree of darkness light, and color is not normally an essential part of the explanation realistic painting were derived from intermixed? The transformation theory visible if light is not present. of color. Plato used the concept of studies dating from the 11th to 14th applies not just to color, so problems arise when Light propagates through the “line of sight” to explain how we centuries. we try to collate it directly with the mixture of light and darkness theory. The definition can probably medium of air, an idea related to see shapes and colors. Aristotle, be virtually matched bylimiting it to “color the Aristotlean theory of visual however, postulated a reverse theory transformation theory.” senses. The explanation of where in which objects and colors are seen color comes from is a speculative because the form of a color image explanation, and is esoteric enough (color species) like a cicada’s abandoned to make even scholars give up in husk enters the eye from the object despair. reduced to a visual perception To summarize, color is explained pyramid shape with the eye at its as existing on the boundaries apex. Common concepts in ancient (surfaces) of objects. The question of color theories included ones in how many colors exist is discussed which light was a transparent color, Fig.

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