The Mute Colours is a six-​channel video installation based on conversations with three climate scientists and one environmental scientist. Yue Wu’s interviews with experts on the perception of climate change are juxtaposed with images from the news, climate models and other visualisations of climate change. Colour plays an important role – monochrome colour fields covering the entire screen serve to structure the image-​based narrative which is accompanied by audio of the scientists’ voices.

The use of the colours is inspired by the Warming Stripes created by scientist Ed Hawkins. The colours used here were originally extracted from minerals and plants. By researching ancient Chinese Buddhist sculptures and traditional Japanese colours, Yue Wu determined the origin of colours and their codes for digital production.

The installation reflects on the urgency of understanding climate change; the cause of climate change, the introduction of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide and methane, and how climate change affects life; while the narration of the audio recording comes to the definition of three important ecosystem types in Switzerland; are they affected by climate change? How do they influence climate change? 

'The application of traditional Chinese colors is influenced by a color system dominated by conceptual intervention under the strong influence of Huaxia culture. The construction of the color system has clear political, ethical, and cultural purposes. These are reflected in the initial conceptual color system of the Five Elements and intermediate colors, which are incorporated into the concept of the Five Elements.

The identity shift between the primary and intermediate colors as part of the construction pattern of the color system. In other words, the ethical identity of a color is not fixed and stable. '

 I can only assume that each culture has a specific color ideology. At least I noticed it in Tibetan culture and cultures in southwest China, Chinese Huaxia culture, and Japanese culture.

This color ideology inspired me, and I transformed the concept into my work The Mute Colors. I do not copy the traditional ideology, but I play with relations of primary and intermediate colors, reflecting on their origins, which plants, and which mineral the colors are made of.

If colours exist in high high-dimension world? We do not know. I hope yes. It's also fun to think of Color from a Classical Optics perspective.