Colour is power.

Colour is power. Colour is language, and colour has baggage. And it’s a major part of the baggage we carry as artists.

I wonder who first discovered that certain animals are colour blind? I had to look up what kind of tests are done on animals, to verify whether they can or cannot see different colours. 

There are behavioural experiments where biologists teach animals to hit on certain colour panels for rewards. And some just cannot learn to distinguish red from blue, for a little biscuit. That seems easy, when you consider the opposite - some dogs get given electric shocks when they choose the wrong colour. 

I can relate to that: a situation where the threat of pain makes you choose the right shade. On some level, for visual artists, it’s either good colour or starvation.

We know, also, that there’s no such thing as making a bull furious with a red piece of fabric. They couldn’t care less. They’re basically broken because they’re bleeding to death. And there’s a crowd of humans cheering it on.

Apparently, with a microscope you can count the cone cells in mammal’s eyes, to see how many colours they can perceive. For people, we need a similar framework for emotions. 

It’s a great pity that human empathy cannot be scientifically evaluated - Fringe