a greenish light

“It was still dark, although a greenish light was brightening in the east. A thin, treacherous breeze was creeping in from the same direction.”

—Alexander Solzhenitsyn, from One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, 1978; translated from the Russian by H.T. Willetts, 1991.

‘the mystery of mysteries’

“Many modern flags that include green are those of Muslim countries, since the cloak and banner of Mohammed were said to be green, and in the Qur’an . . . the Blessed in Paradise were to wear green silk robes. A fourteenth-century Persian theologian, Alaoddwa Semanani, held that Mohammed himself was a shining green in his role as the Divine Centre, since this was the colour most appropriate to ‘the mystery of mysteries’.”

—John Gage, from Color in Art, 2006. Pictured is the national flag of Saudi Arabia. The Arabic text reads ‘There is no God, but Allah, and Mohammed is his Prophet.’

Shellfish purple

“Shellfish purple was the most highly valued dyestuff in the ancient world because of its exceptionally laborious and hence costly processing, and its unrivalled light-fastness and durability. These characteristics made purple—at least in theory—for many centuries the legally enforced prerogative of the imperial household and government; and throughout the Middle Ages, and even in modern times, it has continued to be an emblem of royalty. But the colour purple remains a mystery, because the early literature suggests not only that it was classed as a type of red, but also that the best purple-red cloth looked dark by reflected light, but a fiery-red by transmitted light, and also had a much-admired surface sheen. . . . The erosion of the surface and modern lighting make this original sheen very hard to appreciate now.”

—John Gage, from Color in Art, 2006.

white as the whitest vanilla ice cream

“And there on the dummy in the center of the room was the phosphorescent, the miraculously white-fired ghost with the incredible lapels, the precise stitching, the neat buttonholes. Standing with the white illumination of the suit upon his cheeks, Martinez suddenly felt he was in church. White! White! It was white as the whitest vanilla ice cream, as the bottled milk in tenement halls at dawn. White as a winter cloud all alone in the moonlit sky late at night. . . . Shutting his eyes, he could see it printed on his lids. He knew what color his dreams would be this night.”

—Ray Bradbury, from The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit, 1958.

GREEN DUSK FOR DREAMING

““‘GREEN DUSK FOR DREAMING BRAND PURE NORTHERN AIR,’” he read. “‘Derived from the atmosphere of the white Arctic in the spring of 1900, and mixed with the wind from the Hudson Valley in the month of April, 1910, and containing particles of dust seen shining in the sunset of one day in the meadows around Grinnell, Iowa, when a cool air rose to be captured from a lake and a little creek and a natural spring.’””

—Ray Bradbury, from Dandelion Wine, 1953.

the yellow of them

“And here were the lions now, fifteen feet away, so real, so feverishly and startlingly real that you could feel the prickling fur on your hand, and your mouth was stuffed with the dusty upholstery smell of their heated pelts, and the yellow of them was in your eyes like the yellow of an exquisite French tapestry, the yellows of lions and summer grass, and the sound of the matted lion lungs exhaling on the silent noontide, and the smell of meat from the panting, dripping mouths.”

—Ray Bradbury, from The Veldt, 1950.

a black pattern on a white background

“It was painted a very bright red, an odd color, I thought, for anything in space. There was some lettering on the side—apparently in English, though I couldn’t make out the words at this distance. As the projectile slowly revolved, a black pattern on a white background came into view. . . .

Clearly painted on the side of the slowly approaching missile was the symbol of death—the skull and crossbones.”

—Arthur C. Clarke, Islands in the Sky, 1952.

sorrow and screaming and melancholy and decay

“His use of colour is above all lyrical. He feels colours and he reveals his feelings through colours; he does not see them in isolation. He does not just see yellow, red and blue and violet; he sees sorrow and screaming and melancholy and decay.”

—Sigbjorn Obstfelder, on Edvard Munch, 1893; quoted by John Gage in Color in Art, 2006. Pictured above is The Lonely Ones (Two Human Beings), an Edvard Munch woodcut print from 1899.

‘unnameable’ or ‘indefinable’ colours

“Van Gogh and Seurat occasionally spoke of ‘unnameable’ or ‘indefinable’ colours, which suggests how much the spread of colour-order systems in the late nineteenth century had led to the expectation that colours could indeed be defined. . . . The indefinable colours were of special interest to Gauguin, who was careful to avoid the strong contrasts of his friend Van Gogh, and who specifically exploited secondary and tertiary hues in the interest of what he called ‘enigma.’”

—John Gage, from Color in Art, 2006.

bright colours

“In childhood [a man] loves bright colours and perceives them in their pure form—yellow, red, green, blue. This . . . is characteristic for all children, both in the town and in the country: their consciousness seems to be on the same level. The only difference we may note is that town children more often use pure colour from the darker end of the spectrum than village children.”

—Kazimir Malevich, (1878-1935); quoted in Color in Art, by John Gage, 2006.