Los colores simbólicos

This short treatise on traditional colour symbolism, written in a meticulous and exhaustive manner, is one of the few available in a language of the Western world. Its theoretical foundation consists of the concept that everything manifested essentially proceeds from a metaphysical principle and expresses reality according to its order of existence. Colours also obey this law and, with respect to their specific degree, fit into the main unity.

Colour symbolism is a universal mode of expression that has crossed cultures and religions from India to China and Persia. This important element of iconography is found in the temples of Egypt, the monuments of Greece and Rome, and then in the Middle Ages and the stained glass windows of Gothic cathedrals. Sacred books, from the Vedic texts to the Bible and the Koran, make constant use of the symbolism of colour.

Frédéric du Portal traces in detail the journey of symbolic colours through the centuries, and his extensive research has led him to the conviction that ‘colours had the same meaning among all the peoples of high antiquity’. Based on exhaustive documentation, Portal explains the principles and laws governing the language of colours.

A fascinating, thought-provoking book that remains a reference for artists and students of art history.