«The painting of sounds, noises and smells rejects:
All muted colors, even those obtained directly and without using tricks like patinas and glazes.
The banality of those velvets, silks and flesh tints which are too human, too refined, too soft, and flowers which are too pale and drooping.
Greys, browns and all muddy colors.
The use of pure horizontal and vertical lines, and all other dead lines.
The right angle, which we consider passionless.
The cube, the pyramid and all other static shapes.
The unities of time and place.
«The painting of sounds, noises and smells calls for:
Reds, rrrrreds, the rrrrrreddest rrrrrrreds that shouuuuuuut.
Greens, that can never be greener, greeeeeeeeeeeens that screeeeeeam, yellows, as violent as can be: polenta yellows, saffron yellows, brass yellows.
All the colors of speed, of joy, of carousings and fantastic carnivals, of fireworks, cafe-chantants and music-halls; all colors seen in movement, colors experienced in time and not in space.
The dynamic arabesque, which is the sole reality created by the artist in the depths of his feeling.
The clash of all the acute angles, which we have already called the angles of will.
Oblique lines which fall on the observer like so many bolts from the blue, along with lines of depth.
The sphere, the ellipse that spins, the upside-down cone, the spiral and all the dynamic forms which the infinite powers of an artist’s genius are able to uncover.
Perspective obtained not as the objectivity of distances but as a subjective interpenetration of hard and soft, sharp and dull forms.
As a universal subject and as the sole reason for a painting’s existence: the significance of its dynamic construction (polyphonic architectural whole). Architecture is usually thought of as something static; this is wrong. What we have in mind is an architecture similar to the dynamic musical architecture achieved by the Futurist musician Pratella. Architecture is found in the movement of colors, of smoke from a chimney, and in metallic structures, when they are experienced in a violent, chaotic state of mind.
The inverted cone (the natural shape of an explosion), the slanting cylinder and cone.
The collision of two cones at their apexes (the natural shape of a water spout) with flexible or curving lines (a clown jumping, dancers).
The zig-zag and the wavy line.
Ellipsoidal curves considered as straight lines in movement.
Lines and volumes seen as plastic transcendentalism, that is, according to their characteristic degree of curvature or obliqueness, determined by the painter’s state of mind.
Echoes of lines and volumes in movement.
Plastic complementarism (for both forms and colors), based on the law of equivalent contrasts and on the opposite poles of the spectrum. This complementarism derives from an imbalance of forms (which are hence forced to move) The consequent elimination of the complements of volumes. We must reject these because like a pair of crutches they allow only a single movement, forward and backward, and not the total movement that we call spherical expansion in space.
The continuity and simultaneity of the plastic transcendency of the animal mineral, vegetable and mechanical kingdoms.
Abstract plastic wholes, corresponding not to our sight but to the sensations which derive from sounds, noises, smells and all the unknown forces that surround us» (Carrà: 1913).
Schematization of the correspondences between colors and musical timbres
Colors
Musical timbres
Yellow Trumpet; Sound of the fanfare
Azure Flute
Blue Deep sounds from the organ
Dark blue Cello
Very dark blue Bass
Green Middle tones of the violin
White Temporary pause
Black Conclusive pause
Gray Lack of sound
Bright red Fanfare; Tuba/Horn
Crimson red Drum-roll; Tuba/Horn
Cool red Medium and deep tones of the cello
Bright cool red Other tones of the violin
Orange Middle bells of the church; Strong contralto voice; Viola
Violet English horn; Bagpipe
Deep purple Deep tones of the woodwinds; Bassoon
colored musical keys:
C# Purple
F# Bright Blue/Violet
B Blue
E Sky Blue
A Green
D Yellow
G Orange
C Red
F Deep Red
Bb Rose/Steel
Eb Flesh
Ab Violet
Db Purple (same as C#)
Gb Bright Blue/Violet (same as F#)
octave green
seventh blue-violet
major sixth fire red
minor sixth red-violet
augmented fifth dark brown
fifth gold
diminished fifth blue
fourth brown-yellow
major third bright red
minor third gold
major wholetone black
major wholetone black
minor second white
minor wholetone grey
double-octave black
twelfth purple
eleventh blue
octave green
fifth red
fourth yellow
base white
red = tonic
orange = minor third
yellow = fourth
green = fifth
blue = major sixth
indigo = seventh
violet = eighth (octave)
B = (dark) violet
Bb = agate
A = violet
Ab = crimson
G = red
F# = orange
F = golden yellow
E = yellow
Eb = olive green
D = green
C# = pale green
C = blue
B major gloomy, dark blue with steel shine
Bb major darkish
A major clear, pink
Ab major greysh-vioket
G major brownish-gold, light
F# major green, clear (color of greenery)
F major green, clear (color of greenery)
E major blue, sapphire, bright
Eb major dark, gloomy, grey-bluish
D major daylight, yellowish, royal
Db major darkish, warm
C major white
The Victorian era "philosophical toys" also had their color-music versions, including "chromatrope" slides for Magic Lanterns, in which layers of colored glass could be rotated by a hand-crank to produce moving mandalas, as well as abstract cycles for Zoetropes, Phenakisticopes and Praxinoscopes.
Wilfred called his color organ the Clavilux, and named the artform of color-music projections "Lumia." He stressed polymorphous, fluid streams of color slowly metamorphosing.
Blanc-Gatti also invented a color-organ called the "Chromophonic Orchestra," which contained images of musical instruments around the screen, and displayed colors based on a system that equated the frequencies of sound and color vibrations, so "low" tones would be red, medium tones yellow and green, and very "high" notes violet.
Fischinger's Lumigraph hides the lighting elements in a large frame, from which only a thin slit emits light. In a darkened room (with a black background) you can not see anything except when something moves into the thin "sheet" of light, so, by moving a finger-tip around in a circle in this light field, you can trace a colored circle (colored filters can be selected and changed by the performer). Any object can be used: a gloved hand, a drum-stick, a pot-lid (for a solid circle), a child's block (for a square), etc
