ARTS ROLE IN CHROMOGNOSIS
Art and colors have long been endowed with healing potentials. From the cave paintings of Altimira and Lascaux, through the stupas of Borobudur and Karakorum, to the iconography of the Islamic caliphs and the tankas of the high Himalayas, art and colors were usually cloistered within the domains of shamans and priests, ayatollahs and kings.
Cleopatra had such an affinity with one shade of purple that she made five hundred servants soak 20,000 Pupura mollusks for 10 days just to yield an ounce of Tyrian purple dye. Its deep violet color would become known as royal purpleĀ and only royalty wore it, from Alexander the Great to the Seleucid emperors, until the fall of the Roman Empire.
White though has been the most consistently therapeutic color. It is the universal color of truce and is also associated with peace. Romans believed it produced tranquility and they wore white to bed to ensure good dreams. That's probably why most bed sheets have been white since the time of Augustus.
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"Restrainedly" 35 x 45 by John Phillip Davis
