Blue is the color of life and death. Metaphysics of color

The book is dedicated to the phenomenon of color in art and other areas of culture and practical activities - from primitive magic to modern fashion. The author explores the natural and historical origins of the multicolored culture, revealing the richness of the symbolic meanings and aesthetic values ​​contained in it. Throughout millennia, white and black, yellow and green, red and purple have supplemented, and moreover - shaped the language of art. But the main color on the palette, according to Jan Baleka, was and remains the color blue - calming and at the same time intimidating, friendly and formidable, majestic and mournful, heavenly and devilish, spiritual and base. This unique multiplicity of meanings of blue, accompanying a person from birth to death, is traced in the works of artists of different eras and nationalities - architects, sculptors, painters, poets, writers, playwrights, composers. The book is addressed to art historians and cultural studies scholars, graduate students and students studying aesthetics, as well as to a wide range of readers interested in the history of artistic culture.