By Basab Dasgupta
Holi celebration is often called the festival of colors. One of the key attractions of the festivities is playful spraying of colored water on others and smearing faces of each other with colored powder. Holi symbolizes triumph of good over evil and the divine love between Krishna and Radha. It also marks the end of wintertime and beginning of spring.
As an artist, I love colors and as a physicist I wonder why we can “see” only a narrow range of the entire electromagnetic spectrum. I often wonder what living in a black and white world would be like if there were no color. Can we still celebrate Holi in such a world?
From a cosmic point of view, sunlight will still be white, and nights will be pitch black. What about our day-to-day activities?
Consider all useful functions that a society needs to do to sustain its existence. Our day starts with kids going to school to learn how to read, write and do math. They use paper and pen/pencil; teachers use chalk on blackboards. Clearly those activities remain unaffected.
The working parents go to their workplaces and deal with accounting ledgers, engineering drawings, architectural plans, typing memos and reports, X-rays and other medical images, etc., once again items that involve only black and white color.
We can certainly continue shopping for all merchandise because paying for the items typically involves scanning a barcode and swiping a credit card, neither one of which requires color.
For our entertainment, we will have to rely on black and white televisions and movies. While that may seem unthinkable to the younger generation, this was how we were entertained sixty or so years ago. There will be no problem playing chess, checkers, or doing crossword puzzles. If you want to go outdoors, carry a soccer ball which is black and white.
Traveling by cars will be no different because the streets will look the same along with “zebra crossings”. There will be no difference in appearances of food items like Oreo cookies, milk, Coca-Cola, rice and rohu fish.
If we go to the zoo, many animal species will look the same. These include pandas, zebras, white tigers, elephants, bears, alligators, killer whales (Orca), skunks, dalmatians, penguins, lemurs, ostriches, many snake, bird and fish species etc.
We won’t be able to paint in color, but we can still do images in black and white and pencil sketches. Graphic artists can continue doing exotic patterns ala M. C. Escher.
We will be able to wave a white flag to surrender and release white doves during wartime..
Most of us dream in black and white and we can sleep just like before. Also, remember all our other senses are still active as before; we can listen to music and converse, taste food, smell perfumes and get excited by human touch. There will be no problem in playing the piano, drums or guitars. In practical applications where color is key, such as traffic lights and national flags, colors can be replaced by unique black and white symbols and patterns.
So, who will suffer from lack of color?
The answer: Creative, romantic and emotional people. Most romantic items including flowers, rainbows, balloons, red wines, sunrises and sunsets, butterflies and fall color will immediately lose their appeal. Fashion designers who design colorful costumes for fashion models and women, in general, will suffer major financial losses. Companies selling color printers and cameras will go out of business. Artists, poets and photographers will be without anything to inspire them.
Color also triggers emotions. There is an entire area of Color Psychology that studies the impact of color on how we feel and our behavior patterns. For example, red/yellow color invokes passion, warmth if not anger while blue/green colors are conducive to peace and calmness. We may become more mechanical and robotic without color. Think of R2D2, the robot from the Star Wars movies which is in black and white.
There will be minor inconveniences. No more colorful bar charts or pie charts in presentations and color coding. No showing of yellow cards during soccer matches. No use of color in uniforms to distinguish affiliations. Santa suits will no longer be red. We will have to identify fruits by their shapes. Chameleons will no longer be able to hide. Since the color of our hair and eyes will now appear in black and white, perhaps our concept of beauty might change.
Identification of various organs and veins during critical surgery can become an issue if the surgeon cannot distinguish between different pieces because of lack of color. They will need to rely on other methods of identification – by size, shape and structure.
To summarize, it seems that all the left-brained activities will be unaffected if we turn off color. Lack of color will affect emotions and creativity of right-brained people.
I believe that God gave the senses of color in our eyes only over a certain range of wavelengths so that we can appreciate the impact of color in our life; we will certainly survive but realize that we need color to feel Him. God can be achieved through creativity and emotions. At the same time, he did not want to present all the colors because he did not want to convert this earth into a heaven. It is like serving food samples before the main dinner; people are enticed by the taste of the sample and then make an effort to attend the dinner.
There will be a new twist to the black and white segregation based on skin color. We will have to classify people according to the shade of gray their skin color belongs to. This could be more subtle and less divisive. Color blindness will no longer be a source of embarrassment.
Coming back to the Holi festival, we will still be able to celebrate it to some extent. We can light a bonfire the night before to symbolize “Holika Dahan”. We can still mark the end of winter, symbolized by white snow and the beginning of spring indicated by dark soil and dark leaves on the trees. We can still express joy at the triumph of good over evil and portray an image of union between Krishna and Radha because Krishna is dark-complexioned, and Radha is fair.
The story in mythology goes that Krishna was worried about his complexion being unattractive to Radha. His mother, Yashoda suggested that he paint Radha’s face with color. He did exactly that and Radha fell in love with him. This is a metaphor for color bringing one closer to God.
In a black and white world, we will not get any inspiration to seek out God; we may pretend to celebrate Holi, but it would be a Godless event.
The Holi celebration tells us that color is the key to achieving God and experiencing His power.
Basab Dasgupta has a doctorate in physics from University of Wisconsin and worked with Sony as Vice President of an operating division. Retired, he now lives in San Clemente, CA.
(Disclaimer: The views expressed are not necessarily those of The South Asian Times)
