Color Myth Busted: Just Because They're Colors Doesn't Mean They Go Together
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Color Myth Busted: Just Because They're Colors Doesn't Mean They Go Together
As a professional artist and painting instructor I look at lots of paintings. I see them in workshops I teach, in books, in museums, in shows and online. I see lots of paintings that do not have harmonious color - the colors simply don’t fit together, don’t work together. I know that the artist either has no knowledge of color theory or simply discounts it as not important.
It’s fine if you don’t want to embrace color theory to have harmonious color in your paintings - but be ware that the use of random color will be disconcerting and will never have the power of pieces that embrace the science of color. Color science, in the form of the colorwheel has been around for just over 300 years. All the color harmonies are worked out and someone else has done the work to figure it all out. All you have to do is learn a bit about it to harness the power that the greatest artists of the last 300 years have used.
Get an art history book with color pictures or go to a museum and see the power of color science in action for yourself. Most of the greatest paintings from the greatest artists of the last 300 years sing with harmonious color. The colors work with each other rather than against each other. Color science is used to unify compositions. Local color is often replaced by unifying color - maybe the sky isn’t blue and the grass isn’t green!
If you aren’t harnessing the unifying power of the colorwheel then your paintings will not be as visually powerful as they could be. If you need assistance is learning more about color and how to apply it in paintings, then click the link below next to the logo for my new digital course called “All About Color.”
If you'd like to learn about abstract painting, then please join me for a painting workshop: (You can view a list of 2020 workshops HERE)
February 19-21 Gadsden Art Center, Quincy, FL. Contact Anissa Ford. Email: anissa.ford@gadsdenarts.org. For information and registration Click Here.
March 9-11 Hickory Museum of Art, Hickory, NC. Contact Ginny Zellmer, Email: gzellmer@hickoryart.org. For information and registration Click Here.
March 26-28 Franciscan Life Process Center, Lowell, MI. Contact Kathy Bechtel, Email: kbechtel@lifeprocesscenter.org. For information and registration Click Here.
April 3-4 Greenville, SC, Greenville Center for Creative Arts. Contact: Liz Rundorff Smith, Email: liz@artcentergreenville.org. For information and registration Click Here.
April 22-24 David M. Kessler Fine Art Studio, Winston-Salem, NC. For information and registration, Click Here.
May 1-3 Tubac School of Fine Art, Tubac, AZ. For information and registration Click Here.
May 20-22 Hill Country Arts Foundation, Ingram, TX. For information and registration Click Here.
June 12-14 Fort Smith Regional Art Museum, Fort Smith, AR. For information and registration Click Here.
As always, thanks for your support!
David
Artsy T-Shirts
If you have seen my videos on YouTube or taken one of my workshops, you have probably seen me wearing these great t-shirts that I designed. I have long sleeve, short sleeve, sweatshirts, unisex styles, women's styles, etc.
You can see the shirts HERE.
ALL ABOUT COLOR is my newest online course that will show you a straightforward, no nonsense, clear and easily understandable approach to using harmonious color in your paintings.
