Art

COLOR: The visible wavelengths of the electromagnetic radiation spectrum.

There is a continuum of energy in the Universe called the electromagnetic radiation spectrum. On this spectrum is a wide range of energy, from high energy to low energy. On the high energy side of the spectrum are gamma rays, x-rays, and ultraviolet light. On the low energy side of the spectrum is infrared light, then microwaves and radio waves. Our skin is sensitive to ultra-violet light, and we use simple instruments to help sense infrared light. In the middle of the spectrum, between high and low energy, is a tiny portion to which our eyes are sensitive. This is called "color".

In decreasing order of energy, the colors as they appear in the visible spectrum are violet, blue, green, yellow, orange and red. Sunlight is considered "white light", containing the full spectrum of color. In a variety of ways, when sunlight gets to earth, the white light is broken into its different components and we see the individual parts, what we will call "hues". On page 94 of your text there is a diagram of how a prism separates the white light into the color of a rainbow.

If "color" refers to the full spectrum of violet, blue, green, yellow, orange and red, then how do we define and describe each component individually? As you’ve found by now in these lectures, we will establish some terms that can be used as tools for discussion.

When looking at color there are four characteristics that you should be able to discuss. Your book lists three of them on page 96, but there is an essential fourth element I’d like to include. They are hue, intensity, value (light level), and temperature. After going through the terms we will then look at examples and apply the information to our observations.

Hue: the actual color.

For the time being, what you would usually refer to as color will be called a hue. "The hue of the apple is red, the hue of the car is green", etc. This is simple identification of which portion of the spectrum you see. The are three categories of hues that are commonly used both for discussion and simple color theory; primary, secondary and tertiary colors. To understand how these categories work, open page 88 in your book to see the image of a color wheel.

Primary colors: red, yellow, and blue

Secondary color: Orange, green and violet. The combination of two primary hues results in secondary hues. If you mix yellow and blue you get green, blue and red make violet and yellow and red make orange. The secondary hues can be found halfway between the primaries on the wheel. Yellow, red and blue. These are the three hues from which all other hues can be mixed.

Tertiary colors: Yellow/green, yellow/orange, blue/green, blue/violet, red-violet and red/orange. Tertiary hues are made by mixing a primary and secondary hue that are next to each other on the color wheel i.e.: yellow mixed with green makes yellow/green. They exist halfway between neighboring primary and secondary hues.

When looking at the color wheel, notice that there is no black or white. Black does not exist as a color — we refer to it as a shade. When a hue is darkened with black it is called a shade of the hue, when lightened with white it is called a tint.

On page 88-89 of the book is a good discussion of how simple color wheel theory has been used at an advanced level. George Seurat was a Post-Impressionist painter (to be covered later in the course) who studied the way hues were created and how they appeared in relation to each other.

>

On page 92 of your text book is a detail of his most well known image "A Sunday on La Grande Jatte" from 1884-86 (which many of you said you'd take home from the Art Institute of Chicago if given the chance). In this painting, he placed dots of pure hues next to each other to create the illusion of other hues. When creating a shadow he placed tiny dots of red and blue next to each other allowing the blues to dominate, creating a cool tertiary blue-violet shadow. You can see in the detail on page 99 how he lightened and warmed the green of the grass by adding mostly yellow dots around the green dots, and then shifted to more blue and green dots for the shadows. Come back to this example after you’ve covered the remaining color characteristics and look at how he manipulated them using the color wheel.

Once the hue is identified, the next of the four characteristics is intensity.

Intensity: The richness or purity of a hue.

When describing a hue’s intensity, we can say that it is rich, saturated, dull, drab, etc. Thinking of a fire engine, is the red you see dull or intense? "Fire engine red" is an excellent example of intense red. A good analogy is a sponge soaked with water - when a sponge doesn’t hold water it is unsaturated. If you squeeze it nothing comes out. Put that sponge in water for a few minutes and then pick it up. Its has become much heavier or more "saturated" with water. If you squeeze it now, excess water runs down your hands and elbows. Repeating this analogy but making the water red, when the sponge holds more red water in it we say it’s saturated (intense) and when there’s less red water it is unsaturated (dull). Going back to the fire engine, if you could "squeeze" the fire engine, would a lot of red come out of it, as if it was the sponge? When there is a lot of "red" in the red or "blue" in the blue, it is an intense hue.

Look around you to find other examples of varying intensities in hues. How about a blue sky versus an old pair of blue jeans? Both are blue but one is intense and the other dull. How about green grass and the green of an army uniform? Which is more intense? It is extremely important not to just identify something as being intense or dull, but to describe a level — "it’s very intense, it’s slightly dull…"

The third characteristic refers to the level of light the hue has.

Value: the lightness or darkness of a hue.

This is probably the easiest of the characteristics to identify. How light or dark is the hue you’r e looking at. Which is lighter, which is darker, the blue of the ocean or the blue of the sky? The green of a leaf of the green of a dollar bill? Identify two objects with the same hue in the room your are in right now. Which is lighter, which is darker? Again, as with intensity, describe the level of light versus dark. Is the hue extremely dark or very light? Is it in the middle of the value scale or slightly to one side?

The last of the four characteristics is temperature.

Temperature: the visual warmth or coolness of a hue.

Does the hue look warm or cold? Blue, violet and green tend to appear "cool" to the eye of most people. Our associations with these hues are water, snow, ice, dampness, etc. Red, orange and yellow tend to appear "warm" to our eyes, the association being fire, sun, earth, etc. It’s important to note that these temperatures are not absolute. It is possible for blue to be warm if used properly, though it may never be as warm as orange, or for red to be cool, though probably never as cool as green. A cold violet may appear warm if used in contrast with an even colder blue, or a warm red may appear cool next to a hot yellow.

When applying these terms first identify the hues you see, then for each one observe their level of intensity, value and temperature. Think of these four characteristics as separate radio dials. You can "tune" each one to suit how you see. A hue you identify may be very intense, dark and hot or it could be dull, middle gray and cool. The possibilities are endless. Each characteristic can work independently of the others.

The electronic reproduction of hues on computer may not demonstrate the variation of these characteristics clearly enough, so for the worksheet we’ll look at examples in the book.

We’ve seen this lithograph by Calder before when discussing shape.

>

The hues are red, yellow and blue (primary grouping). Yellow is the lightest hue, blue is the darkest and red is in between them. They are all very intense (this may be hard to see on your screen), but students often see either the yellow or red as most intense. Red is the warmest with yellow close behind (or do you see the reverse?!) and blue, though not cold, is the coolest of the three. Black, a shade, is obviously darker than any of the hues.

Make a comparative observation of the hues as they change when looking at this image by Edward Hopper.

>

All the same hues are there, but most of the characteristics have changed. The yellow has become darker, warmer, and duller. Blue has become lighter, warmer and less intense. Red is lighter, duller and cooler.

Do the same with the Monet below comparing to the Hopper this time.

>

The yellow is much lighter, much cooler and much duller (yellow is very subtle in the original painting, so you may not see it in reproduction. It is located mostly in the skyline just above the trees. Blue is equally light for the most part, cooler and more intense. Red is lighter, cooler and less intense.

Make one more set of observations in this painting by Kossof.

>

Looking closely, the full color wheel is being used here. The hues we’ve been watching, red, yellow and blue, have all gotten middle gray, middle temperature and dull. There is not much visual "energy" to this use of color. Move back and forth between the four paintings and track how the same hues shift, how the "radio dials" of color characteristics change with each image. Remember that each characteristic can function independently of the others; just because a color is cold doesn’t mean it’s dull, or if it is intense it may not necessarily be light. At the start, use the characteristics as a checklist until you become used to describing the hues more fluently.

These terms, your color "vocabulary", will continue to be used when talking about the mood and perception of color. They ways in which color can affect mood are infinite. Rather than trying to give you a list of the emotional qualities of color, I’d like to offer a couple of examples from which you can make decisions and examine your own responses.

In and of itself, color can communicate mood without any reference to narrative, or a story. The best way to view this is through a comparative look at shifting hues in the same painting.

Below is "The Old Guitarist" by Picasso (also can be seen at the Art Institute of Chicago!). Do a quick color analysis of the hues; generally blue, blue-green with some yellows, dull, cool but not cold, middle gray. What mood does this painting communicate? Try to look just at the hues, NOT the narrative. Write down your response.

 

The next image is exactly the same, but there is a distinct shift in the characteristics of the hues. Write down your observations as to the shift in characteristics of the hues, and how the mood has changed.

>

Notice that when the hues changed the mood changed, but the image is exactly the same. Students in class often feel the blue version is melancholy, sad, heavy, etc., and the red version is more romantic, nostalgic and peaceful. Even in the abstract, color can communicate emotions and energy. Mark Rothko was a color field painter who studied color relationships and meaning by applying large areas of color on top of each other with various types of edges. In the two paintings of his that follow, write down your analysis of the hues as well as a subjective response to the emotion of the color. Remember that nothing changes just because there isn’t a picture to "read". Have you ever been moved by music that had melody and rhythm but no words? Recognizable images are the "words" of art and while they can be wonderful to guide you through the meaning of an image, the visual elements communicate to you aside from the narrative.

 

 

In the first image the hues are generally orange with darker shades. Overall it is dull, warm and rests in the middle of the value scale. The second image is generally blue with tints and shades to lighten and darken it, is a little intense (more than the orange?), cool and is in the middle to middle dark part of the value scale. Subjective responses to these pieces often have to do with subtle forms of emotions, low energy and heaviness caused by the general dullness of the hues and the almost neutral, grayish quality of light. Note how the elements here are described to support the subjective response. In this analysis the terms are not being used as an end in themselves, but to express/support an opinion.

There are two additional terms that will be helpful to analyze the use of color in an artwork: spatial movement and complimentary color.

Spatial movement - depth created by the use of color. Intense, warm hues tend to visually move forward in space. Dull, cool hues tend to recede in space.

Note the "flat" appearance in this painting by Gauguin. The ocean in the background looks as though it is equally distant from the viewer as the foreground because the blue of the ocean is more intense than the red or brown. Visually, it "pops" forward based on its color characteristics.

>

The same thing occurs is this image by R.B. Kitaj.

>

In the hall at right, linear perspective is being used to create space receding back to the porter. However, the red in the hall is equally intense and warm throughout, so the illusion of depth is flattened. We could say that the two spatial effects in this image create visual tension.

 

Primary Colors:  Red, Blue & Yellow (base of all other colors)

Secondary Colors:  2 primary colors mixed together (Green, Orange, Violet)

Tertiary Colors:  Primary + Secondary color (Yellow-Green, Blue-Green; Red-Orange, Yellow-Orange; Red-Violet; Blue-Violet

Color Temperatures:  Colors that are next to each other on the color wheel

• Cool Colors:  Violets, Blues, Greens
• Warm Colors: Reds, Oranges, Yellows
• Neutral "Colors":  White, Black, Greys, Browns

Color Schemes (text refers to these as "Color Harmonies" but is limited in scope p. 97-99)

• Achromatic Color Scheme = LACKS color = Grey Scale. An "A" = lacks; "chrom" = color
  • Restricted Palette 
  • Example:  Pablo Picasso, Guernica, 1937, O/C, 11'6" x 25'6" Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid

• Monochromatic Color Scheme = Mono = one; chrom = color = composition composed of tints & shades of ONE color
  • Restricted Palette 
  • Promotes a single, dominant mood 
  • Example: Pablo Picasso, The Tragedy, 1903, oil on wood, 41 7/16" x 27 3/16" National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

• Analogous Color Scheme = composed of colors NEXT to each other on the color wheel
  • Restricted Palette
  • Promotes a single, dominant mood
  • Example: Claude Monet, Water Lilies, 1906, O/C, 35 3/8" × 37 1/16" Art Institute of Chicago

• Triadic Color Scheme = composed of any THREE colors equidistant from each other
  • Restricted Palette
  • Example:  Peit Mondrian, Composition II in Red, Blue & Yellow, 1930, O/C, 23.4" x 23.4" Private Collection

• Complementary Color Scheme = composed of colors that are OPPOSITE each other on the color wheel
  • Open Palette
  • Example: Vincent van Gogh, Starry Night, 1889, O/C, 28.7” x 36.25” Museum of Modern Art, NYC

• Local Color Scheme = composed of colors as they would be seen in nature or reality
  • Open Palette
  • Example:  Edouard Manet, Olympia, O/C, 51.4” x 74.8” Musée d'Orsay, Paris

• Arbitrary Color Scheme = composed of colors that have NO relation to reality or nature, such as a blue cow or purple horse; may be more emotionally or symbolically significant
  • Open Palette
  • Example:  Andy Warhol, Marilyn Monroe Suite, 1967, portfolio of 10 screen prints, each 36" x 36" Museum of Modern Art, NYC