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This puzzle belongs to the puzzle series: hyper-modern art

The two friends move on in the gallery.

"You have now shown me two examples of hyper-modern art, but I still don't quite get it. What is this 'art' all about?"

"Art, my friend, should draw the observer closer, involve him, make him think or feel. Hyper-modern art aims at this with a slightly different angle. To understand an image, the observer has too fully engage with it until he discovers the things which rule the image underneath. By doing so, the image depicts exactly what can not be seen. Do you understand?"

"Hmm, I see how this applies to the two previous examples, but it doesn't help me much with understanding any new piece, does it? Just look at what is hanging here: Why on earth is the picture called The (colour) star, if the star is absolutely not of that colour?"

"Exactly! You have to see the invisible part of the picture to understand why it can only be that colour, my friend. But to make it easier, why not switch on your special HUD device to make it visible to you..."

"Oh."

HM3

The goal of the puzzle is to find the colour of the central circle marked with the star. It is one of the 7 colour used by the other circles (Red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, or violet.) A complete answer must give both the colour and the explanation of why it is the correct colour. (Bonus: What does the HUD show?)

Hints

  • The outer ring colours are "paler" for visual effect only. The whole puzzle is based on 7 distinct colours and the solution is one of those 7.

  • The puzzle can be solved with a printed version of the image above. (Or by just looking at that image above.)

  • The puzzle has a single, objective and logical solution. The "Pattern" tag for this puzzle is appropriate. Basically the whole images follows a specific rule, and the central circle has to fulfil that rule as well, which defines its colour.

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  • $\begingroup$ Do the positions of the dots matter? (Including the star). $\endgroup$ Commented May 18, 2015 at 13:10
  • $\begingroup$ @Daedric: Maybe. I can not answer these types of questions without going down the "ask-yes-no-narrow-it-down" route to a solution. However, all that is needed for the puzzle are three things (plus the question): the Image and the two tags (visual & pattern). $\endgroup$ Commented May 18, 2015 at 13:12
  • $\begingroup$ Theory: Because this can be solved with a printed version, the distances of each circle from the star in the center are significant. That would be easier to discover with a compass (or a ruler in a pinch). Their positions may even be more significant than their colors. $\endgroup$ Commented May 18, 2015 at 19:42

8 Answers 8

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The central star should be coloured:

Indigo (dark blue)

The reason is, that if you draw a hexagonal grid across everything like this (excuse the sloppy photoshop work):

enter image description here

Then, for any given dot, you simply:

count up the number of dots on any of the intersecting lines, which will always give the same sum, based on the colour of the dot you chose:
Red - 0
Orange - 1
Yellow - 2
Green - 3
Blue - 4
Indigo - 5
Violet - 6

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    $\begingroup$ @BmyGuest - which means I think I also understand your other puzzle... But unfortunately I don't have time right now to actually verify and write it up. Will have to leave the glory there to someone else (unless it survives until tomorrow). :) $\endgroup$ Commented May 20, 2015 at 6:29
  • $\begingroup$ Now that you've solved puzzles, maybe you can tackle the remaining "hyper-modern-art" gallery puzzle as well? It's open for a long time... $\endgroup$ Commented May 20, 2015 at 15:14
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    $\begingroup$ Wow, another excellent answer. Very impressive. Even if someone had superimposed the grid for me, it would still have taken forever for me to figure it out from there! $\endgroup$ Commented Jun 1, 2015 at 18:13
  • $\begingroup$ Strictly speaking, BmyGuest called blue cyan and indigo blue. Your explanation is a bit confusing for people like me who assume that color naming. $\endgroup$ Commented Jul 11, 2025 at 8:47
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New Answer:

Purple

Why?

If you take the image and superimpose the horizontal mirror image onto it, and then take the vertical mirror image of the result and combine them together, you get the image below (which I believe is what the HUD showed). You then see a distinct pattern around the star with the cyan and green/purple and blue that makes the star purple.

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  • $\begingroup$ +1 for the answer. It is not the correct one (and it would be hard to explain which "general" rule applies to colorize all circles), but your image shows an interesting aspect of this puzzle which might give new ideas. BTW, I indeed was thinking of creating a puzzle with rotation/mirroring at one point, but then decided against it because there is already a puzzle with this idea (puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/6652/reading-the-stars). $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 15:56
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Leaving for posterity's sake

I'm going to guess

Yellow

Because:

If you run lines to every combination within the same colored dots, every color is passed over except yellow. While there is only one purple dot, it is still crossed many times by many other dots.

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  • $\begingroup$ Interesting idea and +1 for being the first who actually tries to establish a formal rule. It is, however, not the correct solution. (And if you'd colorize the central dot yellow and apply your rule, it would be violated.) $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 13:55
  • $\begingroup$ @BmyGuest how would the rule be violated? I guess I didn't express it correctly, but my theory was that every color should be crossed by another. By coloring the center yellow, that would make yellow conform that rule. $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 14:38
  • $\begingroup$ I see. However, in this case your rule is broken by the red circles already. They are not crossed by any colour neither. (Or did you mean that at least the red link is crossed by another colour?) $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 14:40
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    $\begingroup$ @BmyGuest Ah, I see the confusion. Yes, I was considering the links as well as the circles. $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 14:42
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    $\begingroup$ I think it might be better to post a 2nd answer - which then gets separate votes and comments. Can you do so? I'll comment on that one then... $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 14:58
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I'm going to say that the star is indigo. My reasoning for this is in referring to the center as the star; this is a map of the night sky. The orange circles match up to Ursa Major, and the green ones to the Summer Triangle. If you match up an image of the Triangle with the art piece above, the central star appears to be Gamma Cygni, which would mean it is indigo like the other two stars in Cygnus.

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    $\begingroup$ Interesting idea, but not the (intended) solution. Can you provide the pictures of the night sky with matching distances? This puzzle has a precise and accurate solution. $\endgroup$ Commented May 18, 2015 at 12:05
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    $\begingroup$ The five orange circles on the right do look a bit Big Dipper like, but the handle is on the wrong side and the sixth circle in the bottom left doesn't seem to fit. $\endgroup$ Commented May 18, 2015 at 12:40
  • $\begingroup$ The sixth circle in the bottom left would be Polaris, from what I can see. They're both associated with the Ursa constellation, is the point. $\endgroup$ Commented May 18, 2015 at 15:39
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I think the answer is

ORANGE

Why?

Because yellow mixed with red forms orange :-) LOL

From the rainbow:

Violet 1 Seq 1
Indigo 3 Odd
Blue   2 Seq 2
Green  3 Odd
Yellow 1 Seq 1
Orange 6 NotOdd
Red    2 Seq 2

To make the number of oranges odd… the central star should be orange. :-)

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    $\begingroup$ Your answer is even more puzzling than my puzzle. LOL :c) (But not correct.) $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 17:49
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I guess it's

AQUA/CYAN

with the help of @tfitzger image i came to this conclusion.
Because:

Purple is formed using orange + blue
so there is 3 beams passing the star major once are green and blue which gives CYAN color.

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  • $\begingroup$ Also an interesting idea (but wrong.) However, such a rule would - again by @tfityger 's image - be easily broken: f.e. the blue circle on the right is not a mixture of green and orange... $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 14:33
  • $\begingroup$ Good try though :P $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 14:35
  • $\begingroup$ Sure. Mild spoiler ahead: tfitzger's image is an interesting starting point (and a proper start), but it is not the image the solution is based on. $\endgroup$ Commented May 19, 2015 at 14:42
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is it:

RED?

I used the developer tools to check its color ^^

The result is:

RGB: rgb(43, 42, 41); HEX: #2b2a29 , which contains mainly RED color.

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  • $\begingroup$ What a curious approach! $\endgroup$ Commented May 18, 2015 at 13:51
  • $\begingroup$ Nice idea but contradicts the statement that one can solve the puzzle with a (colour)printed version of the image. No, the puzzle does not contain trickery are cryptography. $\endgroup$ Commented May 18, 2015 at 14:57
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The color of the star is purple. Colors are arranged according to the rule of the rainbow.

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  • $\begingroup$ Hi Juri. Welcome to the site. When you post an answer, you need to explain it a bit better. How do you see this "rule" work? $\endgroup$ Commented Aug 15, 2018 at 10:34
  • $\begingroup$ @BmyGuest I think they meant proximity to the center = color, but that's obviously broken by several circles. Even if we loop it, 2 circles right next to it have the same distance and one is green, while the other is blue. $\endgroup$ Commented Jul 11, 2025 at 8:59

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