Mind games and variations about the colour blue

During our trips we often hear this sentence from our guests: “oh, what a wonderful blue sea – or “wow, the water seems cristal clear.”

Depending on the state of cloud cover, the blue colour is sometimes more, othertimes less intensive. Under a gloriously blue sky, the sea appears azure up to cobalt blue. Thats when sun rays enter far in the deep, creating a strong blue. If the weather is rather grey and cloudy, then the water colour changes to a washed-out grey-brownish blue. Before night falls, the color of the ocean can have a blue like being galvanized. The night blue which follows when the sun sets, is like blue velvet, slowly masking the remaining colours of the day. Even in its frozen state, water can still be blue. In the polar regions there are blue icebergs. Then, navigators recognise, that it is multi-year ice and therefore especially strong.

Explanations about how the blue colour of the water is developing are complex. Amongst others, colours are generated through the interaction of reflection and absorption. When sunlight enters water, it interacts with its atoms and molecules and can create a colour. Also the amount of phytoplancton and nutrients plays an important role for the intensity of the water colour. The clear and dark blue of the high seas point rather out that the water is nutrient-poor. Those areas are, considered from a biological perspective, rather water deserts, with few living beings. At least in their upper water layers. The coloration of the oceans can be even detected via satellite which can also inform about current algae blooms.

Further more, the colour blue is generally quite popular. Where does this come from? Is it because blue stands as a symbol for the unsearchable depths of our oceans as well as for the vastness of the universe? When astronauts gaze at our planet, the Earth appears like a blue jewel. Three fourths of the earth is covered with oceans, which reflects the sunlight back up to outer space.

Within anthroposophy Rudolf Steiner spoke about blue as from the one of the three colours of glint. With glint he meant gleam of the spirit. Sometimes blue is mentioned as the colour of the melancholy. By way of contrast, blue stands also for faith and reliability. Used in the therapy with colours, blue has a calming and relaxing effect, which can strengthen inner peace and balance. If patients gets “coated” in blue light, they profit and have less tensions and even migraine can be softened down.

In eastern countries, in former times, windows and doors were painted blue. In this way, they wanted to catch and focus the good spirits and the look of the gods on themselves. A whole desert tribe, the Tuareg, are called the “blue tribe”. In their tradition, they are wearing blue coloured clothes. Especially their turban and niqab are from an intensive blue.

We gaze at the horizon and notice below us the sea, above the endless sky. Sometimes this delicate line vanishes and then it seems as we can look even further. Up to our innermost.

It has a certain magic, something mystical, this infinite blue, which spreads out before us.

yours Astrid Haas