Environmental colour design for the third millennium: An evolutionary standpoint

Abstract

AbstractThis is a study based on observation, research, literature, and design of the effect of environmentally applied colour on human evolution. Given the structuring abilities of colour, here, it is first examined here how it can help to make the emerging man–environment system a living evolvable entity. Then follows a description of a related design approach for improvement by lighting design as practiced recently by world‐known artists and researched by the Colour Semiotics Study Group under the author's direction. It is argued that, by its increasing complexity, flexibility, and sensorimotor stimulation, environmental colour may raise not only the visual but also the broader perceptual capacities of man with regard to selected qualities. The extension of the human consciousness through machine‐aided imagery and scientific knowledge, finally, calls for a new kind of colour–light organization of the environment, based on the interplay of sensory stimulation and intellectual processes, professional design, and user interaction, in tune with our new understanding of the cosmologic law as constant regeneration. The very structure of this article is intended to exemplify the concept of the portended intertwining of cognitive and intuitive processes in the act of creation central to the study.