Kandinsky claims that a circle of yellow will seem to ooze from its center and even warmly approach us, while a similar circle of blue ‘moves into itself, like a snail retreating into its shell, and draws away from the spectator. The eye feels stung by the first circle while it is absorbed into the second’ (Concerning the Spiritual in Art). Yellow cannot readily ingest gray. It clamors for white. But blue will swallow black like a bell swallows silence ‘to echo a grief that is hardly human.’ Because blue contracts, retreats, it is the color of transcendence, leading us away in pursuit of the infinite. From infra-red to ultra-violet, the long waves sink and the short waves rise. ‘Just as orange is red brought nearer to humanity by yellow, so violet is red withdrawn from humanity by blue.’
William H. Gass, On Being Blue
