African Color Science is an ongoing research project exploring the symbolic functions of color in traditional art and medicine from Egypt and West Africa to the Caribbean and Americas. We explore a variety of indigenous regions and their use of plants and minerals for creative applications in painting, fiber and natural healing methods. Through the lens of African cosmology, this project embraces the value of the color spectrum for deepening spiritual connection and achieving holistic health.
Color is a universal language that displays the mathematical intelligence of nature. Far from abstract, color comes from living creatures and geological processes. Our relationship to color is complex and highly influenced by environmental factors. The way we engage with color is rooted in our social conditioning and ancestral memory. When studied as an active mechanism, the color of an organism can reveal its role in the ecosystem, its properties and characteristics, and its benefits for the human body.
West African culture is the result of a vast migration of ancient Black civilizations from the Nile Valley on the eastern coast to other regions on the continent. In Yoruba chromatography, colors are associated with spiritual energy, derived from natural sources and used in art, medicine and rituals. In southern Ghana, Akan priestesses apply pigments to the body during ceremonies and festivals by painting, stamping and dyeing the skin with colors that have cultural meaning. There are many similarities in the presence of these substances between African diasporic traditions and native communities in Southeast Asia and the Americas.
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