Shuji Asada
INTERVIEW with Shuji Asada, Head of Department,Textile, Kyoto Seika University, Japan.
What is your relation to colour? & Why? My favourite colour is Red that is the colour of my subject in my work it is the power of life and the energy of life, and for me it is in a way the essence of life. I like red, I started using only black and white in my work and then later I introduced colour, I mostly use red, blue and black. Red is for me the energy of life and blue is the limitations of life those colours control me and don't free my mind - I feel restricted by them. Blue is suppressing, and I think people get a lot of limits from society, and therefore forgetting pleasure and energy of life by living in this prison society is. In my work I use both organic shapes and straight edges. The straight edges are a symbol of the limitations in life and therefore I have chosen to use blue and black. I want to show creation of life between the contrasts of shape and colour, they always seem to be related to each other, you can't separate them it is difficult to talk about colour on its own.
How important do you think colour is to us? Red.Colours have a big impression on me, red uplifts me if I am depressed or gives me power if I wear it, it can make me feel stronger and support me.
Do you dream in colour? I don't know.
Could you imagine a world in Black/White only? My work used to be in black and white and I actually think I see colours there too so no I can't imagine a world in black and white only.
What do you think of when I say Black? It is difficult but when I was using black in my work I then felt it was a symbol of a priest of Zen. Black is not a colour of emotions it is quiet and in control and I am a very emotional person so I am attracted to black but also repelled.
What do you think of when I say Gold? It is too decorative for me, it signifies money and power and I hate that, I prefer silver, it's more beautiful and doesn't signify showing off so much. I combine it with religion and have never used it in my work, there I have always been using cotton and not silk for the same reason, because cotton is warmer to me and more friendly - human if you like.
What do you think of when I say Pink? Pink excites people, it is scandalous I like that. Colours change depending on who uses them and where they are being used. In Japan elderly women don't use pink only lighter rose because it is in this country too strong for their age. In Western countries I believe silence is silly, here it is gold - and pink is not a silent colour.
Do you think colour has a masculine and a feminine appeal? Red is masculine, pink as well, I can't tell if it is also feminine because I am not a woman, but yellow I guess is feminine and some pinks are. I think many women look up to pink. It is diffficult for me to say what is feminine and what is masculine.
Do you think colour affect our senses?Yes, the colours in our environment or the lack of them will affect our mind and well-beings, I strongly believe that.
Do you think colour blinds perceive the world differently? Yes, yeah, maybe, I guess so, but I have no idea really.
Could you imagine the colours in a traffic light to be different? We don't make a difference between green and blue in Japan, we call an apple blue and a traffic-light blue, also the leaves on a tree can be blue, here there is no distinction, we also say about a young person that he is blue. There are so many different names to colours it probably stems from the nature.
Which colour would the living room in the house of your dreams be? I don't like colours in a house, I am not used to it.
Which colour would the kitchen in the house of your dreams be? I like natural colours in my house the muddy and wooden walls.
Which colour would the bed room in the house of your dreams be?I would never have a room in pink, I would then think I was in a Lovehotel, if that was the case, it would be too much.
Jacki Parry
INTERVIEW with Jacki Parry, Artist, Senior Tutor & former Head of Dep.Printmaking, Glasgow School of Art, Scotland
What is your relation to colour? I suppose I mainly use colour in relation to the material I use. In the objects I make I'm involved with the structural properties of the paper and beating the fibre, the time of and strength of the beating can depend on the depth and also the translucency of the colour, so I suppose I'm involved with colour that way in the context of the material, but then I'm also interested in the opacity of the colour and creating different tones within the paper itself by trying to find methods for doing that, by inhibiting the drying time in certain areas.
What is your favourite colour? I like pink very much. I like orange, I like red, I like blue, a golden yellow, I like Indian red, I like black, blue-black or grey. I like all colours really I suppose. I don't often use colour of equal hue value together, mainly I'm using a strong colour alongside a neutral or a natural colour or some kind of grey or black or white; or sometimes a white with a tiny bit of colour in it so it's not absolutely dead white. So I'm using those kinds of contrasts presently. I suppose coming out of a background in Printmaking I was drawn more to etching and always interested more in black and white and that graphic sense of using colour, so I guess I mainly use black, white or grey and then colour as a counterpoint to that, but more like one colour than several colours at the same time in a work.
How important do you think colour is to us? A world without colour I can't imagine, I think it's important and I think it's huge enhancing or depressing so I think that for me that's probably the way I use colour to think about it or to assist thinking about a particular kind of mood of a peace of work that I want to communicate.
What do you think of when I say black? Lovely. What I am interested in at the moment is trying to see if you can have a translucent black and still have it black so that light is able to pass through it in these skins that I am trying to develop these membranes of paper - but so far I haven't been able to achieve it it's remained quite opaque. It seems like a contradiction that you can have light coming through black, it's kind of a challenge. But I love black.
What do you think of when I say gold? Gorgeous. I think of a cornfield an old jacket I used to have, sunflowers and certain varieties of pumpkins of lots of things I suppose.
What do you think of when I say pink? Ohhh, I think of everything from something that is very pale and seems to maybe just denote something to do with the body or flesh but it's not so explicitly to the other extreme that is something like fluorescent pink which is mad zappy tasteless and fun. I'd like to be able to make that colour.
Do you think colour has a masculine and a feminine appeal? I don't think of it like that but certain pinks for me are very feminine.
Do you dream in colour? I think so yeah, something I never really think about it.
Could you imagine a world in Black & White only? No, I couldn't. Wouldn't want to be there.
Do you think the colour of our clothes affect our personality? Hopefully yeah possibly but I think it's also in a broader consciousness in the way that the society that we live in is constructed and what the rules are and what we are taught to believe, how much we are actually influenced by that.
Does colour affect our senses? Ohhh, I think so yeah. I suppose it has as much to do with the presence and the absence of light I can respond to that rather than necessary colours as such, but there's no doubt that when it comes to February or even before then it's like an illness longing for spring, longing for light and colours, I feel that.
Which colour would the living room in the house of your dreams be? A kind of white with a bit of something else in it maybe a tiny bit of pink in it, that or I might be tempted to do it a really bright golden yellow not a lemon yellow but a sort of golden, sort of egg yoke colour.
Which colour would the kitchen and bedroom in the house of your dreams be? Maybe I'd have a very pale grey in the bedroom, something calm. I don't like over decoration, I don't like to be constrained in the space and I like the light to come through. I don't want to make those big decisions that make you aware of it all the time and then everything has to be designed to go within that to work. Sometimes colours can be so powerful that they can close up a space. I don't want to think about the space I am in, but just be there. I don't want the wall to make a kind of a statement.
Akira Kurosaki
INTERVIEW with Akira Kurosaki, Head of Department, Printmaking, Kyoto Seika University, Japan.
What is your relation to colour? For me colour is very important in relation to culture, history, tradition and religion. I am still searching for the role colour has in Japanese culture.
What is your favourite colour? And why? Red. Because it is the colour of blood our body, very emotional especially in Japan you find a lot of red, but totally different from a mailbox or a bus in London. Here it is a different red you see. Chinese use another red closer to Vermillion, a yellowish red that is still not orange. The Chinese are more fond of Vermillion whereas the Japanese are more keen on a real red, so probably there exists a thousand different reds, but if you visit a traditional religious Japanese festival you can find a Japanese red totally different form the reds you see in Europe. But I like red and green in London, but I feel it is very much related to different traditions how the colours are perceived.
How important do you think colour is to us? I feel that an artist can make a message to the viewer by using certain colours, so I believe it is very important. I always believe that colour can show my senses and emotions to the viewer. I think Edward Munch was one of the first artists to use colour to express his ideas or rather senses in an interesting way. He was using red or Vermillion to express his fear of facing others and his fear of living. Many artists use their own colours, but his colours were showing his emotions and his mental state perfectly. His work is very strong.
Do you dream in colour? I don't remember. I always forget my dreams probably I do because I always think of colours.
Could you imagine a world in Black & White only? No. No I couldn't. Maybe...Rembrandt could imagine a world in Black/white only for him the light was the most important issue it was not colour. So he was like a camera...haha, where as we are more like rainbows...haha.
What do you think of when I say Black? Darkness, hell, my name means black cave, Kuro saki, Kuro means black and saki means cave so it means a dark cave. I like black I love red but I like black. It also reminds me of calligraphy and Sumi-ink paintings, of drawings and also darkness, so it has a big range of symbols. My work totally changed after the 90's, when I was only painting in black/white because I got tired of colours and I wanted to change myself and was strongly influenced by Chinese Art, Calligraphy and Sumi paintings, so I wanted for a while to almost avoid colours in my work.
What do you think of when I say Gold? Mascarade, Ancient King, The Ring by Wagner.
What do you think of when I say Pink? There are a lot of cheap pinks and kitschy stuff I prefer a more sophisticated pink like from Ancient times in Greece and the archaeological sites of the Romans. There I find beautiful pinks that have faded out over time. I have been to Greece just this spring to chase those colours in Antipolis I found an ancient villa where on some part of the wall this colour was preserved - sooo beautiful! I have an interest in how time has an influence on colours and how it always affects them beautifully. That is if they are natural, if they are chemical they fade out and become grey later. I always want to try to make such a beauty but it takes many many years to reach that.
Do you think colour has a masculine and a feminine appeal? I never think about that.You can see from my work that I was a colourist. I was inspired by Ukiyo-e, Japanese woodblock prints where they use a lot of red, very energetic and dramatic. The black is almost demonic.
Do you think colour affect our senses? I think I have changed, when I was young I liked very vivid colours, but then later I was interested in the depths of the black, different tones of the black, I wanted to find a colour inside of the black. Now I am more interested in sophisticated pinks that have faded out. Over time I have changed my taste and my favourite colour therefore as well. I needed to use these strong colours when I was younger, but now I don't need to express myself so strongly so I prefer colours of nature. Colours have a very important meaning behind your ideas, so I cannot believe the artists who never change! Some blacks even have a huge range of colours.
Do you think the colour blind perceive the world in a different way? I don't know because I am not colour blind or perhaps I AM colour blind! I cannot tell. A colour blind can be a colourist, I think.
Could you imagine the colours in a traffic light to be different? A Traffic light doesn't show any emotions, so I don't care about it - it is just a signal.
Which colour would the living room in the house of your dreams be? It would only have the colours of the actual materials.
Which colour would the kitchen in the house of your dreams be? No, no I would use no paint.
Which colour would the bedroom in the house of your dreams be? Yes, the colours of the cedar wood.
Paul Simmons
INTERVIEW with Paul Simmons, Interior & Textile Designer at the company Timorous Beasties, Glasgow
What is your relation to colour? Personally colour is probably what I am worse at though it is a very important thing. I see it in a different way because I work with it a lot, so my relation is quite professional. I have to think of it not in ways that I enjoy colour but in ways that I can see colour working in environments and interior environment usually. Sometimes I go wow that's an amazing blue or an amazing orange but usually the way my mind works will be that's a great colour how will it work on a textile or with other colours because I am always working in colour separations. I have to think often that I don't go for bright colours I have to mix colours together. Say a lime green and a blue and another colour it will end up like a pizza really. I think of it in lots of different ways some people might walk along the street and look at it and think it is just a really nice bright colour but I always think of ways that I am going to use colour. Colour changes you can look at colours and you can look back at different decades and certain colours worked that don't work now. It's a bit like fashion. There is no such thing as a new colour you can't invent a new colour but certain colours seem to be right at certain times in history.
What is your favorite colour? Ohh, that changes as well. I have gone through all sorts of phases. A brown phase. At the moment I like brown and blue a lot, I haven't gone into an orange phase yet now I like red and pink and red and white.
How important do you think colour is to us? In terms of work it is very important if you look at it commercially you can sell something on its colour alone. You don't have to have an amazing design but if the colours are right then it can work really really well. Then in terms of life I do think some people are emphasizing it too much. You get these people saying ohhh I think you need to change the colour of your room to change your well-being. I don't think colour really changes your life or maybe it does I don't know. There maybe too much emphasis on that, it is not that bright colours make you feel happpy and dark colours make you feel somber and moody. It's not as cut and dry but I believe in certain amounts of it. I do believe that green is a relaxing colour but then again there is a huge spectrum of green I mean lime green isn't necessary relaxing either so it depends. I don't go through my day thinking that's an amazing colour and that's an amazing colour that makes me feel really brilliant about lie. I do sometimes see it in terms of colour combinations. I have bursts of it but it's just like lots of things in life I mean trees are such an amazing thing but you don't stop and look at trees every day and say wow aren't trees amazing.
Do you dream in colour? I have got no idea. I did have really strange dream last night. I guess I do, I must do.
Could you imagine a world in Black & White only? No not at all I would certainly not like a world in black and white. I like some black and white things but I would hate a world in black and white.
What do you think of when I say Black? I think of the sky at night.
What do you think of when I say Gold? Wuuuooow I just come up with clich豠such as a rising sun yeah?! I mean that's the first thing that comes to my head. I don't like gold that much at the moment I might like it in 10 years who knows.
What do you think of when I say Pink? I like pink I think of pigs or something when I think of pink, yeah. I really like pink I used to hate pink but at the moment I seem to really like it. It is quite a girly colour and people use it in that way it has got all those connotations of being tacky as well and trashy American horrible curtains. The pink I like is a particular kind of pink more of a dusty quite dark pink.
Do you think colour has a masculine and a feminine appeal? Yeah. The example there would be a male being blue and female being pink, what I imagine being masculine is a navy blue and yellow can be feminine too.
Do you think colour affect our senses? Yeah, I mean colour is one of our senses isn't it ? All these sort of things I believe in visual sense and esthetics are something that we use so much every day every second that we are alive it is all visual and yet we don't really know how to judge things. There is almost an intelligence there you could be really bad at Mathematics, which I think I am but you could be a really good mathematician but visually, I think certain people maybe aren't so visually aware or don't get so much pleasure from looking around and looking at things. I think some people are better at it than others like some scientists are better at working something out than I am and I think colour comes into that category it comes into someones visual awareness. I have to think of colour quite a lot because of what I do I think would probably be better qualified at picking some nice colours than the woman living next door to me.
Do you think the colourblind perceive the world in a different way? Yeah, I guess so definitely I don't know what it is quite, people that are colourblind so I imagine still sort of know what certain colours are although they cant see green they will know that the trees are green or I don't know how it exactly works but there must be someway it's not quite like a black and white photo or film. I feel a little bit sorry for people that are colourblind it's a a bit like not being able to taste or something.
Could you imagine the colours in a trafficlight to be different? Well, not really. I can imagine it but because I don't have to worry about that I don't really think about it that much.
Which colour would the livingroom in the house of your dreams be? At the moment I would have a red livingroom, a nice warm quite cosy red, a nice red livingroom.
- and in the kitchen? I'd just have my kitchen white. I like colours as well when they are singled out or white onto different colours.I love white onto red, when I think of living room I like red but I'd have white leather sofas or something.
- and in the bedroom? My bedroom, I like when two colours are verging I quite like colours that are in between two colours like pink and violet or blue and purple some things that are in between pink and red. I quite like inbetweenies I'd probably have a bedroom in a soothing light colour.When you ask questions like that it is slightly hard because I just dont think anything in life is cut & dry I never think in absolutes I never think there is an absolute answer to anything so certain colours are right in certain livingrooms maybe even in certain decades, depending on shape and size and the others things that are going to go into your room so it's quite hard for me to think it is that or it is this.
Philip Jones Griffiths
INTERVIEW with Philip Jones Griffiths, Abandoned Pharmacy forty years ago to become a Magnum Photographer working mostly in black and white. Published in various Magazines and Newspapers all over the world.
What is your relation to colour? My problem is that I am not colour blind and by that I mean I am not insensitive to colour. I think the best photographers are probably the ones who don't even notice the existence of colour so they can do what photography does best, which is to record those great fleeting moments, those significant interactions between people. The use of form to enhance the message that we are trying to capture a decisive moment of human relationships. Once you realize the effect colours have and the way they work when you are composing, they can be ignored if the camera is loaded with black and white film. Looking at you now through the viewfinder I can ignore your distracting red bag at the edge of frame, but with colour film the primary task becomes how to block it out so that the colour doesn't ruin the picture.
What is your favourite colour? And Why? Judging by my wardrobe most people would say: "Doesn't he know that there are other colours in the world other than green?" On the one hand you could say it is the colour of peace and tranquillity and so on, but then it is also the colour of war, most soldiers are dressed in green. Who knows? It is very hard to tell. I think some of us are affected very early in life. Maybe I liked Robin Hood when I was little. All I know is that I respond favourably to green and whether that is caused by my childhood conditioning or something genetic I really don't know.
How important do you think colour is to us? This is a very interesting question to which no one really has a definitive answer. We are taught from an early age that a colour is pink and another is red but how do we know that we all see it in the same thing? We both agree that it is pink but how do we describe pink? Well, you can only really describe it by giving it a name and then calling it pink or compare it with something else that is also called pink. So whether we actually see the same colour is a fascinating question. I have never studied the subject but there may be answers resulting from stimulating the visual cortex in the brain and get the same response from different people. If the pink you think it is pink and I think it is pink produces the same measurable stimuli then that would be a proof. If I was to be thinking about how I could improve on the picture of the golden Rock in Burma I don't think I would be capable of thinking about it without thinking there is a big lump of Gold and see the yellow colour because that is something specifically colourful. If I think of Cambodia I probably do think of colour more than if I was to think of say, London, but then again there is no comparison because one place is much more colourful than the other. I think these are fascinating questions for which there is no sort of real answer. The perception of colour and the affect it has upon us simply is not proven. It is true that we have certain expectations, we expect blue things to be cold and red things to be hot. And we have a certain expectation that a combination of certain primary colours signifies regal power. The question as to whether it's innate or taught is the important one.
Do you dream in colour? Some people have postulated that we all dream in black and white but we have a paintbox program in our brain to colour the dreams when recollected. Ever since I became aware that I dream in black and white I often wake up and recall it so. When it comes to people who say. "I always dream in colour," I think what they are really saying is that they have many dreams they want to remember. Memorable dreams - odd ones, amazing and confusing ones that are recalled as premonitions are often embellished and part of this is the inclusion of colour.
Could you imagine a world in Black & White only? Yes, that is what my dream world is. The world of my imagination is always in black and white. And my memories too are monochrome. When I think of past dramatic scenarios I never think of them in terms of colour because I don't need to. When I am "painting" pictures in my mind of what I did or how I would react to something, it doesn't have colour in it because for me there is no need for colour and I don't remember in colour. I certainly think that what black and white movies do even today is to give a profundity to the subject matter which you dont get from colour. I think the way in which we respond to the lack of colour is very interesting.
What do you think of when I say Black? Technically, black is the absence of colour. Black holes, darkness and blackness are metaphors for nothingness. But when I think of black I think of the ability to meditate, to think about the truth of things. I am not afraid of the dark for it gives me time to think without distractions - it's an opportunity to meditate. It is the absence of all colours the absence of everything and the lack of all stimuli. In black and white photography the black is very important because it defines structure by and gives a certain monumental profundity to an image.
What do you think of when I say Gold? I think the problem with Gold is that it has many associations. It is very valuable it has been around a long time and as a chemist I know it's a very stable material. It has unwelcome connotations. Those with the gold are the rich and powerful and very few of those are exemplary characters. The golden rule is that "those with the gold, rule" and therefore it has an overtone of exploitation. It is always associated with greed. It has the sort of connotations to me that are not that pleasant.
What do you think of when I say Pink? I basically run away. Pinkness is such an American colour used to indicate sexuality. It is true that some of the most adorable parts of the human anatomy are pink and in fact the polite description for highly sexual female in Japan is "Pink lady." The idea of dressing up little babies in pink is something I dont find it at all attractive.
Do you think colour has a masculine and a feminine appeal? I think that unlike most animals it is the human female who makes herself look attractive and colourful. Colour is certainly used by animals to attract mates. And it is the women who do the attracting and therefore they want to look as attractive as they can and they certainly do that. I suppose the most obvious example is lipstick on kissable lips. The idea is to draw attention to good points by colouring them. As children boys are dressed in blue and girls in pink ostensibly so that people don't get confused so therefore we may be programmed into perceiving that all bright colours are feminine.
Do you think colour affect our senses? Yes, definitely. I once did a story for Fortune Magazine on the food industry. I went to a company making and testing new food products. The interesting point was that the testing all took place in special rooms that were lit with very dim red light because, as it was explained to me, the sense of taste is enhanced by the red end of the spectrum. Here we had scientific proof, because they wouldn't go to the expense of installing the red lights if it didn't enable testers to be more perceptive. However, I don't know whether bathing someone in blue light makes the food tasteless. Or do they become depressed? Do they get the blues? I don't know.
Do you think the colour blind perceive the world in a different way? I don't think the colour blind live more empty lives but possibly more confused ones, especially at traffic lights! Whether a colour blind person can look at a blue room and see it as being warm or look at an orange as being cold, I just don't know the answer.
Could you imagine the colours in a traffic light to be different? If you see red it can mean blood, fire or even worse, a volcano. In other words, red is very much an indication of danger of some kind or another so it's not a bad colour as it is universally perceived as dangerous.
Which colour would the livingroom in the house of your dreams be? - And the kitchen? - And the bedroom? I am all in favor of mellow warm colours, that yellow-orange colour that you find in houses around Italy. I think I would have a light brown wooden floor the walls would be painted yellow and the furniture would be a natural olive-green, and I wouldn_t make exceptions for the bedroom or the kitchen. I would go the same way. Warm, friendly and enticing colours. I suppose I am describing the Log-cabin look in an attempt to get back to nature!
The other thing I am very conscious of is the difference between real colours and artificial colours. We think of real colours that you find in nature, if you have ever done that experiment where you cut out on a piece of black paper the shape of a Maltese cross and you put it on something that will turn it very fast and when you look at the spinning image colours appear that have never been seen in nature. I hate those colours!