# Colour-Music: The Art of Mobile Color/Note by Sir Hubert von Herkomer

INTRODUCTORY NOTE
BY
SIR HUBERT VON HERKOMER, R.A., M.V.O.
The analogy of music to colour has occupied many minds, but, so far as I know, no attempt has been made before to bring it within the scope of physical demonstration; therein lies the great value of Mr. Wallace Rimington's pioneer work in this fascinating field of thought. Although he calls his chief instrument, for the present, a "Colour-Organ," he does not propose to prove by means of it that certain waves of light have their exact parallel in certain waves of sound. He uses the musical keyboard merely as a convenience, and has, for the same purpose, split up the spectrum-band in accordance with the musical octave, but he does not necessarily base his general contentions upon any such division.
One of the instruments with a musical keyboard, which the author has designed, and by ​means of which he projects his colour on to a screen, can be either mute, or made to produce musical sounds simultaneously with the colour.
It has been denied by some that colour suggests musical sounds, and that musical sounds suggest colour. But it is safe to say that a psychological affinity is felt by artists and musicians between sound and colour, hence the use of common terms of expression between them. The painter speaks of a note in a painting, and a musician of a tone picture.
Amongst other claims put forward by the author is that of providing a new source of pleasure—a new art appealing to the mind and the senses—by means of colour alone, without form. But I see something besides all this in it—I see in it something "medicinal" for the painter, a "tonic" for the colour-sense of the artist, a suggester, a corrector, and a purifier.
Most painters in their career pass through several colour phases in their work that are difficult to account for. If there is such a thing as habits of thought (and we know there ​is), one may declare that there is such a thing as habits of colour in the painter. These habits of colouring will enable the spectator to spot a certain painter's work at a glance, and I cannot see that a painter's work can keep fresh and vigorous if he plays on one "note" of colour throughout his life.
Let me here say that the colour-sense is by far the most sensitive and delicate of all the faculties that go to the making of the artist's brain. The sense of form is far more robust and can bear severe handling. For instance, a painter can, by pegging away from a model, get his drawing right in the end, that faculty having something physical in it. Not so with colour; no pegging away can make colour good in a picture. Hence the painter surrounds himself with all manner of richly coloured rugs and hangings, in order to stimulate his sense of colour. I can, therefore, see clearly that an invaluable tonic could be given to the painter's colour-sense by means of Mr. Rimington's instrument for the production of mobile colour, even without necessarily laying stress on the affinity to music. ​To sit at this instrument and improvise for half an hour whilst watching the ever-varying combinations of colour on the screen produced by the playing is not only an unspeakable delight, but of real health-giving effect on the sense of colour. How much more valuable as a stimulant is mobile colour than the fixed colours of a rug, which the eye gets accustomed to, and which thereby act no longer as a tonic.
Perhaps the author has in some measure overstated his case; but much allowance must be made for the enthusiasm of the pioneer. It may be questioned, for example, whether the contemplation of formless colour will call forth such great pleasure in the majority of people as the author believes; whether the close analogy of colour to music will hold good in as many respects as he also claims. In fact, many questions of doubt may arise in the reader's mind. But there is so much in the author's experiments, opening out such vistas of possibilities, that the whole matter should be carefully investigated before judgment is given. Without holding a brief for ​the author, I, for one, believe in the potentialities of his new departure.
An introduction such as this must necessarily be short, therefore I cannot enter into the thousand and one ramifications that surround this fascinating subject. But to sum up briefly, Mr. Rimington's mobile colour system seems to me a method to enable one to see sound and hear colour.
Bushey, Herts, Bushey, .July, 1911.