Blue hour

Praia da Ursa-Sintra-Portugal. A blue hour seascape seen in wide angle. Clearly seen is the zone near the sun where red and green takes precedence over blue, which fills almost the entire hemisphere. The effect is due to Rayleigh scattering.

The blue hour.

Commerzbank Tower in Frankfurt, Germany, during the blue hour.

The Colosseum during the blue hour

The blue hour comes from a French expression, l'heure bleue, which refers to the period of twilight each morning and evening where there is neither full daylight nor complete darkness. The time is considered special because of the quality of the light at this time of day. The blue hour is considered especially flattering for people with blond hair in photography and is often also when the smell of the flowers is at its strongest during the summertime.

A time of innocence

The phrase is also used to refer to Paris immediately prior to World War I, which was considered to be a time of relative innocence.

Influence in popular culture

As a result of the perceived specialness of this time, there are various restaurants, theatres and hotels called L'Heure Bleue located worldwide. There is also a women's perfume by Guerlain (1912) of the same name. The Norwegian rock band Madrugada (Spanish and Portuguese for early morning) were also named after this time.

Songs

The blue hour is also a common theme in popular music and the subject appears in various songs:

• Françoise Hardy - L'Heure Bleue ^[1]
• Vanessa Daou - This Blue Hour
• Roy Orbison - When The Blue Hour Comes
• Turin Brakes - Blue Hour
• Stephen Cummings - Blue Hour
• Andreas Vollenweider - Chanson de l'Heure Bleue (Song of the Blue Hour)
• Christian Death - The Blue Hour
• Nina Gordon - The Blue Hour
• Radiohead - The Gloaming
• Peter Fox - Schwarz zu Blau (Black to blue)

Books

• A novel by T Jefferson Parker.
• A book by Carolyn Forché.
• The cover background of The Junior Encyclopedia of Canada, Volume 5.
• Midnighters trilogy by Scott Westerfeld.
• Blue Moon by Alyson Noël.
• A novel by Kate Thompson.
• The Blueing Hours, a poetry collection by Albert DeGenova.
• L'heure Bleue, a book by Edward Gorey.

Films

• A 1991 film by director Marcel Gisler.
• The first portion of the 1987 episodic film "4 aventures de Reinette et Mirabelle" by Éric Rohmer.
• A 2007 film starring Alyssa Milano.

Art

• l'Heure Bleue is a concept often expressed, in his works and in his thought, by the contemporary artist Jan Fabre^[2].

See also

• Midnight sun
• Polar night
• Green flash
• Golden hour (photography)
• Belt of Venus

References

External links

• Media related to Blue hour at Wikimedia Commons

v • d • e Parts of a day Dawn–Twilight–Sunrise • Morning • Noon • Afternoon • Evening • Sunset–Twilight–Dusk • Night • Midnight Related articles : Blue hour  · Terminator  · Daytime  · White nights