Color attributions in the Hierophant

ravenest

I think your observations also apply to some extent to the Rider-Waite, which tends to defy color analysis. Frankie Albano tried to 'correct' this with P. F. Case's color symbolism, but this may have been somewhat ill conceived. Mary Greer is of the opinion that the Waite did not strictly follow the GD in many respects, and I am in agreement with this. Waite apparently was not happy with the GD ceremonial magic, and this reticence may have applied also to the GD color scales, which, to a large extent, were associated with GD ritualism.

Being, as always, the Fool (Le Mat), I am still interested in the magenta, yellow, cyan color scheme as it applies to the GD Tree of Life.


yeah, I do agree BUT ...


as an artist and magician ... and ESPECIALLY when one makes some GD stuff, it just doesnt work artistically, there are other things to consider as well, like saturation and tone ... some combinations although technically GD correct are garish and horrible. My own stuff I adjust the colours to make it aesthetic. Which Frieda nay have done.

Crowley once said, that after a while, you can walk into a temple and see what is wrong or out of balance at a glance. I dunno ... to make a whole temple that was in sync with these colours sometimes its just horrible. I have done it with painting magic squares with the 4 colur scales for each planet ... some are just horrible and dont work IMO.

Like a ritual , get the theory down, understand the why, then use artistic license.
 

Richard

Red, blue, green are the primary additive colors. Magenta, yellow, cyan are the secondary additive colors. However the primary subtractive colors are MYC. RBG are the secondary subtractive colors.

The cones in the eye are of three types having varying sensitivity to RBG. Yellow is perceived when the R and G receptors are stimulated in a certain proportion.

RYB doesn't work well as subtractive (pigment) primaries because, among other things, magenta and cyan are not in their gamut. Also, the orange, purple, and green secondaries are not uniformly of high chroma. (For example, if R is chosen so that the mixture of R and Y will make a bright orange, then the same R is likely to make a very dull purple when mixed with B.) However, the gamut of MYC primaries does include R and B as well all other colors. In printing it is necessary to include K (actually black ink) in order to adjust the value (lightness or darkness) of colors.

The advantage of RYBG in subtractive coloring is mainly that it has a much larger gamut than RYB.

My feeling is that the ToL colors should be based on the additive primaries, RBG, since these are the light (LVX) primaries. The difficulty is in translating a flawed subtractive system based on RYB into an additive RBG system (or, equivalently, into the correct subtractive system MYC).
 

Richard

yeah, I do agree BUT ...


as an artist and magician ... and ESPECIALLY when one makes some GD stuff, it just doesnt work artistically, there are other things to consider as well, like saturation and tone ... some combinations although technically GD correct are garish and horrible. My own stuff I adjust the colours to make it aesthetic. Which Frieda nay have done.

Crowley once said, that after a while, you can walk into a temple and see what is wrong or out of balance at a glance. I dunno ... to make a whole temple that was in sync with these colours sometimes its just horrible. I have done it with painting magic squares with the 4 colur scales for each planet ... some are just horrible and dont work IMO.

Like a ritual , get the theory down, understand the why, then use artistic license.

You're right. Mainly I'm just curious if something can be worked out which can get the right saturation and tone with a three color palette. As an artist myself, I doubt it. Pigment colors are not just a single hue. Yellow is not just yellow, but a spectral analysis of any yellow pigment shows lots of red and green and other colors. This actually is good, because mixing a pure yellow with a pure blue pigment would give black, not green. Actually, the CMY primaries are theoretically perfect, but there are no perfect CMY pigments. The closest to perfect CMY is printing inks, and they are generally too fugitive for use as pigments.
 

ravenest

yep, thats why I think 'pure' RYB is 'ideal' and related to the supernal triad, sort of like a Platonic Form of colour.

I tried to nut it out a while back , it took ages, I eventually found the right books, one even had tables in the back of what defines RBY in frequencies (which of course is really a standardised opinion) and listed them all very accurately and precisely in frequency range.

Then at the end it had a note saying all of this, of course, depends on light, season, weather and latitude on the planet :laugh:

In the little paper I wrote on colour it has a section on how we name colour as well, that is interesting in light of the colour names (from the old paints used back then) in the GD and 777 documents.

I wonder what they would make of colour 'fashion names' like 'celtic way' and 'alligator alley' (shades of green) or 'bamboo' (my bamboo grove has green, tan, black, yellow, brown ... :) )

or 'coffee' (is that black or white ? ) ... just as well we all know what colour a rose is

http://www.bloomingloopy.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Rolled-Rose-Colour-Chart1.jpg

(love the site name :laugh: )
 

UrbanBramble

I just wanted to say that it's cool to see this thread continue and talk about the more subtle issues of coloration in the tarot. I am happily "lurking" and trying to learn a little from what you all are saying.

Thanks for the source documents, I'm slowly trying to digest all that information.

Also thank you all for not tearing me to shreds when I mixed up the OTO and golden dawn. Very, very embarrassing. I've since straightened all of that out. :)
 

ravenest

I just wanted to say that it's cool to see this thread continue and talk about the more subtle issues of coloration in the tarot. I am happily "lurking" and trying to learn a little from what you all are saying.

Thanks for the source documents, I'm slowly trying to digest all that information.

There are quiet a few threads on it in the files here and the GD section as well. Including references to Don Pavey (whom I like :) );

http://www.bookpump.com/upb/pdf-b/112581Xb.pdf

Don includes an idea that, to me, is close to the 4 scale color divisions in GD / 777, but relates it to sound : colours that; roar or scream, command, speak and whisper (Knight, Queen, Prince, Princess (or the appropriate color divisions equivalent).

Also thank you all for not tearing me to shreds when I mixed up the OTO and golden dawn. Very, very embarrassing. I've since straightened all of that out. :)

It wasnt THAT embarrassing was it ? ... we wouldnt do that to you anyway :)

Thats maenad business;

http://konekrusoskronos.files.wordp...eus-and-the-bacchantes_thumb.jpg?w=1121&h=743
 

Richard

.......Also thank you all for not tearing me to shreds when I mixed up the OTO and golden dawn. Very, very embarrassing. I've since straightened all of that out. :)
Nothing at all to be embarrassed about. It is not as if GD and OTO are at war with one another. There is enough strife between different GD orders to satisfy any warmonger without needing to incite trouble with OTO, which is relatively stable.

Interesting topic.