Yellow

 Yellow expands, cheers; increases energy.  

Yellow is associated with sunshine, knowledge and flourishing of all living creatures, but also with autumn and maturity.

The Sun was one of the most important symbols for Man and was worshiped in many cultures as God.

According to Greek mythology the Sun-god Helios wearing a yellow robe rode in a golden chariot drawn by four fiery horses across the heavenly firmament.

 The radiant yellow light of the Sun personified the divine wisdom.

Surya, the Sun god, riding on his chariot.

Zia Sun Sign

Yellow pigments (goethite and clay) were used the in the wall paintings in the cave of Lascaux 17 000 years ago. Yellow ochre was used by ancient Egyptians to depict skin tones or for painting backgrounds in their wall paintings. Yellow ochre was also used by the ancient Egyptians to cosmetically lighten their skin. Egyptian hieroglyphs are the only known script using color to express meaning - the word "woman" for example was written in yellow characters.

The color yellow (khenet, kenit) was created by the Egyptian artisans using natural ochres or oxides. During the latter part of the new Kingdom, a new method was developed which derived the color using orpiment (arsenic trisulphide).

The poisonous yellow pigment orpiment was prepared by grinding the naturally occurring mineral and used in ancient Egypt but also later in Assyria and China for painting walls and in paintings and illuminated manuscripts. Other more modern yellow pigments frequently used in paintings, such as Naples yellow (lead antimonate) and Chrome yellow (lead chromate) are poisonous too.

Both the sun and gold were yellow and shared the qualities of being imperishable, eternal and indestructible. Thus anything portrayed as yellow in Egyptian art generally carried this connotation.

The skin and bones of the gods were believed to be made of gold. Thus statues of gods were often made of, or plated with gold. Also, mummy masks and cases of the pharaohs were often made of gold. When the pharaoh died he became a god himself.

"White gold", an alloy of gold and silver (electrum), was seen as being the equivalent to gold and sometimes white was used in contexts were yellow would typically be used (and vice-versa).

Ancient Chinese culture considered yellow to be the color of joy, glory and wisdom. Starting with the 3rd millennium B.C. yellow was associated by the Chinese with power and domination, the same role played by red and purple in Roman Empire and in Medieval Europe.

The origin of this meaning (power and domination) of yellow for the Chinese is supposedly the Yellow River (Huang-Ho). The river is named according to its color caused by big amounts of yellow mud carried by its waters. This extraordinarily fertile mud is deposited on the banks of the river in layers up to a thickness of 600 feet.

Many cultures ascribed protective powers to the colors yellow and red. Indian brides wore ragged yellow clothes before the wedding to chase away evil spirits. Yellow is the wedding color for people in many eastern cultures.

Saffron-yellow dyed robes were worn exclusively by the Emperor and Buddhist monks.

Raw material for the dye of robes of Chinese Emperors is the crocus-like saffron plant. During autumn saffron bears pale violet flowers equipped with a four inches long style with three threadlike filaments. Collecting 8000 saffron flowers bring about 100 g of dried brownish red filaments, from which the yellow dye crocin can be extracted. Crocus of ancient times was regarded as the King of the Plants based on the incredible dyeing power of its dye. The color of the dye can be percieved in dilutions up to the ratio of 1 : 200 000. Saffron was used to color cosmetics, wine, foods (e.g. rice) and also as a spice. Roman emperor used it to perfume his bath and the rich people's seats in theater were sprinkled with saffron wine. It was also known for its disinfecting and even healing effects. Saffron dyed mummy bandages document the use of saffron in Ancient Egypt.

Daughters of European royal families were frequently seen wearing saffron dyed silk gowns as a symbol of superiority. Only the expensive silk of pure white color was suitable for dyeing with saffron, cotton and other inferior textiles would get an unsightly grayish tint.

Saffron was reputed to be the color of love and later also of lust. Venus, the Roman Goddess of love wore an yellow robe.

The Birth of Venus by Botticelli

The Gates

http://www.christojeanneclaude.net/tg.html

The negative connotation of yellow as the color of envy and as a label of discrimination has its origin in Middle Ages.

These aspects of yellow led to a change of its connotation in medieval Christianity and it became the color of prostitutes, who were forced to make themselves recognizable by wearing an yellow ribbon, belt or cape.

Today for example, prostitutes carry a yellow health card in Singapore. They must report in "regularly" for health checks.

The next step in the downfall of this color was based on the fact, that yellow was easily sullied by other colors. Greenish-yellow started to be associated with repulsion, pus and leprosy.

Yellow flags designated areas/towns of raging plague and on a ship signaling the outbreak of an epidemic.

Yellow can be discerned from the greatest distance. Traffic signs, changing traffic lights, life jackets and tennis balls are all yellow.

 Yellow (sometimes orange) labels are used to designate hazardous substances.

The robe of the traitor Judas is yellow in the fresco "Judas' Kiss" by Giotto di Bondone (1267-1337).

The reason for all Evil was believed to be the gall and a yellowish complexion denoted anger, eternal envy, jealousy and also stinginess. Stinginess and Envy, two of the seven mortal sins in Christianity, led to even stronger negative connotation of yellow.

Use of this color to express contempt and to ostracize and discriminate human beings culminated in labeling of Jews by Nazi Germany during WWII by the yellow Star of David.

Yellow is the color of the light and warmth and has a stimulating, lightening and warming effect on the soul. Goethe wrote in his Color theory (Farbenlehre):

"In its purest form it carries its bright nature in itself and is of light, spirited, slightly provoking character (...) So it is generally known that yellow makes a warm and cozy impression. We find it in paintings on the illuminated and active side. This warming effect can be felt distinctly by observing a winter landscape through an yellow glass. There is joy for the eye, widening of the heart and lifting of the spirit; a tangible warmth seems to emanate from the glass."

W. Kandinsky describes a different effect of the (glaring) yellow in his book Concerning the spiritual in art:

"Yellow, if steadily gazed at in any geometrical form, has a disturbing influence, and reveals in the color an insistent, aggressive character. (It is worth noting that the sour-tasting lemon and shrill-singing canary are both yellow.) The intensification of the yellow increases the painful shrillness of its note."

Both quotes emphasize the conflicting effects of yellow. Warm golden yellow is perceived in a different way than the loud yellow of a lemon which is sometimes associated with mental deviations.

Warm yellow is used in advertising to suggests light and peaceful feelings.

In synesthesia, the sound of the oboe is clear yellow.

Oboe1

Oboe2

Today hearing "yellow" most painters will see Cadmium Yellow – brilliant and opaque.

Artists' grade Cadmium Yellow oil colors are made from chemically pure cadmium- sulfide pigments. Cadmium is a silvery metal that occurs in nature, but cadmium pigments are manufactured. Oil colors were first made from cadmium yellow pigments in 1819.

Cadmium Yellow replaced toxic chrome (lead) yellows.

Although more expensive than Chrome Yellow, Cadmium Yellow was used by landscape painters, including Claude Monet, because of its higher chroma and its greater purity of color.

Yellow was Vincent Van Gogh's favorite color. He preferred yellow ochre in the beginning of his career, adding the newly discovered pigments cadmium yellow and chrome yellow later on. He transformed the light in his landscapes into pure color. Light signified to him the Sun of the South, lightness of spirit in addition to friendship and love. Van Gogh used yellow in context with its complementary color - blue. He saw power and the entirety of life in the combination of both colors (cf. Wheat fields with crows, 1890). Yellow of Van Gogh mirrors his quest for cheerful and lighthearted life which he was never able to live and also expresses the creative energy innate in this artist.

Olive Trees with Yellow Sky and Sun

Indian yellow

Indian yellow was introduced into India from Persia in the fifteenth century.   Its source remained a mystery for many years.

In its transparency, it makes a glowing warm yellow -- as if a painting were suddenly lit with summer sunshine.

To make Indian Yellow, cows were force fed mango leaves and  give little water. The cows' urine was a bright yellow and was collected in dirt balls and sold as "pigment."

Law prohibited the production of Indian yellow in the early years of the twentieth century. Its departure may have been due to the Indians for whom the torture of sacred animals was against their religion. It also may have been due to British laws that prohibited cruelty to animals.

Indian yellow used today is synthetic......

Warhol's Oxidation Paintings, 1977-78

In December 1977 Andy Warhol began to make a series of elegant, abstract paintings.

These iridescent canvases, made up of coppery yellows, oranges and verdant green strokes, pools and drips, offered Warhol's viewer a sensuous and very physical enjoyment of paint, quite at odds with the crisper images one found in his Pop vocabulary.

Surprisingly, the only paint used by the artist in this very painterly body of work was that employed for the metallic gold ground. The blooms of color that effloresce over the pictorial space were created in quite a unique manner. Warhol paid a assistant to be the 'collaborator' ... He would come to his studio to urinate on canvases that had already been primed with copper-based paint by Warhol.

The uric acid would oxidize the metal in the copper ground, causing it to discolor, allowing for patterns to be created according to the 'movement' of the 'painter'.

For all the conjecture surrounding why Warhol made these somewhat perverse works, one is left, in the final analysis, with objects of extraordinary beauty.

Andy Warhol, Oxidation Painting, copper metallic paint and urine on canvas,
12 panels, 48 x 49 in.