yellow light, blue shadow

‘What is the shadow of white light?’

Gabor had a habit of repeating what you say, ‘White light…White Light…I don’t know.’

And I said, ‘Black. 

Don’t be afraid, because white light does not exist, nor does black shadow exist.’

I think that it is a time of our sun on trial, of all our institutions on trial.

I was brought up when the sunlight was yellow, and the shadow was blue.

But I see it clearly as being white light, and black shadow. 

Yet this is nothing alarming, because I believe there will come a fresh yellow, and a beautiful blue,

and that the revolution will bring forth a new sense of wonder. 

Only from wonder can come our new institutions…

They certainly cannot come from analysis.

-Louis Kahn, Conversations with Students: Architecture at Rice 26