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It is clear. It is empty. My spirit is anguished by color. Color is the sign of the existence of life. I feel like believing, being in a state of pure belief, of affirmation. I exist because I see colors. Sometimes, at other moments, it is as if I didn’t exist, when colors seem foreign, unreachable, impregnable fortresses. But there is no possession of color, only the acceptance of its reality. And if there is no possibility for the possession of color, there is no possession at all. Of whatever it is.

Etel Adnan, Journey to Mount Tamalpais

 

UNO by Kasper De Vos

For 2 to 10 players, 7 years and up. 108 cards, distributed as follows: 19 blue cards, 19 green, 19 red, 19 yellow, 8 take-two cards, 8 turn-over cards, 8 lose turn-cards, 4 choice cards, 4 take-4 cards. The aim of the game is to be the first to score 500 points. A player scores points by getting rid of all the cards they are holding before their opponents do. The cards still held by the opponents determine the number of points awarded to the first player to play out his or her cards. If a player has only one card left, he must call out "UNO" – uno, meaning one. There are several variants that can be played in UNO, but in all of them, the colour on top of the pile is to be followed. This colour can be changed by playing a 'take-4 card' or by laying down one of the four 'choice cards' and calling the colour in which the game is to continue. The colour on top of the pile is the signal colour that must be followed when playing a card. The colours are the three primary colours, in bright tones, plus green. Although green is not one of the primary colours, it is the colour used in the additive colour system, e.g. in monitors, alongside red and blue – yellow is not used. Humans also naturally gravitate towards green as a primary colour. The attraction is so great that, in colour psychology, green is referred to as 'pseudo-primary'. As such, it makes sense to include this colour as the fourth colour in the card game, much more than any other colour. 

Understanding a colour, and following it, also seems to be naturally learned. Furthermore, of all the colours, it appears that the primary colours stir our imagination the most. Miffy, Meccano and the Bauhaus building blocks all make use of the primary colours, and green. The roof is red, the sun yellow, the sky blue and the forest green. It is not clear whether these colours are used because we are attracted to them, or the other way round, that we are attracted to them because they surround us from an early age. In fact, it doesn't matter; the colours become part of our universe and, in addition to their signalling function, they acquire a place in our memory. The sign becomes sense.

Kasper De Vos is fascinated by the memory of colours and their signalling function, as can be seen, for example, in Tintin. In the comic, one can follow the story by means of the text, but also by means of the bright colours of the characters and objects. The bright red rocket, the bright green of Professor Calculus and the bright blue jumper worn by Captain Haddock with his black cap with golden stripes. Thanks to the colours, one can immediately tell the characters' whereabouts in the story and what is going on. What functions in a comic book also functions elsewhere, for example in a shop or in a café. A pint of beer is yellow gold, as are chips. Cheese is orange, a hamburger comes in a red box and a Cécémel (local chocolate milk drink) in an orange-brown carton with blue lettering. Just as we recognise Captain Haddock by the combination of blue, black and golden stripes, we recognise Cécémel, and are fooled in the Aldi supermarket when instead of the real Cécémel, they present us with a variant that has the same appearance.

In the case of De Vos, colors are used based on this emotional meaning. This "emotional reflex", then, becomes the guiding force with which the works are produced, - or composed. Not through the appropriation of colours, but rather by accepting their reality and using them based on their emotional meaning. In their brightness, the colours seem to be an almost clichéd metaphor for an orderly and carefree life. A life in which Cécémel is drunk, a drawing is made and Tintin's 'Rocket to the Moon' is read. Although emotionally readable, the works also confuse. They are not innocent children's drawings or naive games, but fragments of a hyper-capitalist reality that, briefly, endear themselves to us. Apart from a literal reading of the world, it is an attempt to understand it emotionally, or even sense it. In this, colour is not only a guide, but also a host and signifier.

• Godart Bakkers

 

Book presentation ‘UNO - Kasper De Vos'

+ book signing by the artist

& artist talk with Kasper De Vos and Johan Pas

Sunday 5.12.2021 – 3 pm

Auditorium – 3rd floor

This book is published by Stockmans Art Books

in cooperation with PLUS-ONE Gallery.

208 pp.; 187 x 290 mm; softcover

Texts by Michaël Van Remoortere, Antony Hudek, Sofie Gielis, Vincent Van Meenen

For sale from 5 December at € 35 in the M HKA shop.