Colours indicate energy states and processes of change. Transformation of any kind is an extremely complex structure of actions and reactions. Traces of transformation become visible both in the original situation and in the target state. Thus, the change in colour of leaves, acorns and chestnuts indicates the result of the transformation work. Both physical and chemical processes, such as the effect of climate, temperature and pressure, play an important role and influence the result. The greater the lack of solar energy is, the fewer photosynthesis takes place, which results in fruits and leaves turning brown. Eventually, the leaves fall to the ground, where they re-enter the cycle of nature by covering the soil and decomposing into nutrients over time. Transformation work takes time and space. It can be visible or invisible and is triggered by inner or outer impulses.

Brown stands for energy work and feeling self-centered. The body organs associated with brown are spleen, stomach and digestive system. Brown includes all shades of yellow, beige and brown. It is referred to taste “sweet”. Brown is associated with relaxation, serenity as well as with the feeling of having both feet on the ground. The more dominant brown becomes, the more it can lead to over-excitement, blocked emotions, carelessness, a feeling of emptiness or even isolation.

Brown: rare earths, minerals and precious metals

Brown is a colour of silence. Deep underground, transformation processes take place under the influence of pressure and in the absence of daylight, leading to changes in the state of the earth’s mass. Brown is associated with raw material transformation, for example. The formation of ores, minerals and precious metals as well as the formation of oil and lignite deposits require certain climatic conditions and long periods of time for the transformation. Gold, one of the most sought-after precious metals, represents the sun in the earth in the form of metal. Diamonds, which are formed under enormous pressure and at extremely high temperatures deep under the earth’s crust, are among the greatest treasures of our planet. These rare minerals are characterised by chemical purity. In their transparency, they contain all the colours of the rainbow and are considered extremely resistant. They are formed by carbon atoms arranging themselves into solid crystal lattices over millions of years and, in the form of diamonds, embody the radiance of the sun deep inside the earth.

Brown: Earthwork and transformation

Transformations deep in the earth are subject to specific pressure and temperature conditions, some of which differ significantly from those on the surface. Whether in Iceland or on the Kamchatka Peninsula, the earth shows us again and again what natural forces and sources rest within it. In these almost inhospitable places, hardly any human life takes place, even though everything gurgles and pulsates. All the earths, minerals and ores reflect the interrelationships of geology, geography and biology, for they only come into being through the interaction of natural forces inside the earth over enormous periods of time. The colours of individual earths eventually show us which forces were at work and from which elements they were formed.

Brown: time memory in layers of the earth

Earth colours, brown-grey tones and mud colours are considered particularly popular in hotel lounges and winter chalets. They convey cosiness, tranquillity and the spirit of nature. They thus represent an antipole to the busy, sometimes restless lives of business and leisure travellers, who instinctively associate wellbeing with brown shades and colour nuances between espresso and latte macchiato. Natural clay and lime plasters, earths and wood panelling create a feeling of down-to-earthness. At the same time, they stand for exclusivity because the time stored in them is an expression of rarity and preciousness. The more brownish the overall mood, the more soothing the ambience, look and feel. It often remains unaddressed that getting up, motivating oneself and getting into motion again becomes all the more difficult – once one has reached the hights of relaxation.

Brown: Healing powers of nature – archaic and pure

Healing earths and peats were originally formed from minerals as a result of volcanic eruptions, from which bogs were formed. Once moisture-loving plants settled in these bogs, they emitted important nutrients, which were stored in the mud of the bogs after the plants died. Still moist, this mud is used in the form of healing earths. Peat, the dried mud of the bogs, is cut before it is used in different areas. One of the most prominent uses of peat is well known to whiskey lovers – they way how peat reacts with water, climate and air during the distillation process, as well as maturation time and the nature of the cask, have a decisive influence on the result in the glass.

Brown: alchemy – inner wealth

The process of creating material values from invisible, concentrated matter is well known in the financial sector. That is why work with material values, such as money or raw materials, as well as increasingly even with immaterial values such as data, is associated with the colour brown. In this context, trading with coins, paper money, shares, bitcoins and data originally developed from trading with food to sustain life. In the early beginnings of Mankind, root tubers, spices, herbs, salt and building materials constituted wealth. These natural resources were the link between man and nature. In the Middle Ages, salt and coins could be weighed, whereas data has no physical weight. Digital numbers that are displayed on your bank statements are only an electronic image in binary format: these numbers show the account holder’s claim to payment against the bank under the law of obligations, but no longer embody any real material value. After the dissolution of the gold standard in the “Bretton Woods resolutions”, currencies and their valuations are based on market confidence – without any connection to material resources. This example shows that the transformation of natural raw materials into nutrients for the supply of bodily organs specifically and for growth processes in general have lost their connection to reality during the last millennia.

Brown: interaction of self and value

Inner withdrawal manifests itself in brown. The higher the loss of inner values is, the more energy and self-confidence, which are associated with yellow and radiant gold, dwindle. Self-worth is replaced by quiet sadness, the concealment of inner weakness, heaviness in the bowels, depression or complete self-abandonment, maybe even suicide. Inner processes usually take place in concealment and depth, however, their effects only show much later – but then with great force. Similar to a volcanic eruption, transformation processes take place under high pressure. These create destruction and leave behind new landscapes of life after the end of the eruption, which form the breeding ground for a new era. In this cyclic action, a constant alternation of inner and outer processes of change takes place.

Brown: equalising pressure and searching for a home

People under high external pressure feel drawn to consume too much coffee, foods of brown or yellow colour, because they connect them with the idea that they calm and conquer one’s inner restlessness. When encountering the feeling of loss of home and of inner values, a typical reaction of compensation is buying high-quality, usually expensive products such as clothing, watches and jewellery or houses. Thus, the loss of inner home, mobility and self-centeredness is compensated with immobile, material values, preoccupation with money and finances, and the redefinition of inner order through external structures. Active life time is adorned with ‘timeless’ value acquisitions because it is always about money or life instead of money and life. Correction and re-linking on this point requires the existence of real inner life goals, combined with the desire to achieve them.

Brown: uprooting

People often wonder about the occurrence of a new situation, such as illness, accident, coincidence or recognition. “How could this happen?” “Why did it happen so quickly?” – are questions that are often asked in this context. Yet the emergence of these situations is usually similarly slow and time-consuming as crystallisation processes and magma formation in the earth’s interior. Trans-formation processes are often just not noticed or seen in time. Change is always visible – just like the colouring of leaves in nature or the natural texture and colour of hair. Hair loss indicates that processes are taking place inside the body that are tying up all the forces and there is no longer enough energy to keep the hair in place. It is literally about uprooting, inner emptiness and the body’s instinct for self-preservation, as well as about bundling all forces and throwing off ballast – to protect life.

Braun: Einstein’s error and Swissness

Braun is always concerned with processes of transformation in which space, time, climate and centre are formative factors. So it is not surprising that Switzerland, as the land of watches, coffee and chocolate, also captivated the founder of the special and general theory of relativity. Only: “Is Einstein right? ‘In the event of the end of the world, I would prefer to be in Switzerland,’ Albert Einstein is supposed to have said: ‘Everything happens a little later there.’ Is he right? The end of the world would probably be ruffled in the consultation process, but at the latest in parliament. Perhaps even in the Federal Council the different ideas about an appropriate end of the world would be irreconcilable. And then the people! We can assume that they would reject the end of the world. So for once Einstein was wrong: the end of the world would not simply happen later in this country, it would have no chance at all.”

From a speech by Federal Councillor Alain Berset in: “The Confederation in brief. 2021” 43rd ed., ed. Swiss Federal Chancellery BK, 2021, p. 44