Some Thoughts on Color
by Neadeen Masters, CDA
Understanding color helps create the illusion. All art is illusion, if you think about it; a blank canvas is a flat, one-dimensional surface. With the use of our brush, we push and pull colors, blending them on this flat surface, manipulating the normal properties and characteristics of pigments, adjusting the hue, value and intensity, to give birth to our illusion. We continually adjust these colors making them relate to each other and to the painting as a whole. We do this in an effort to fool the eye and create the optical illusion of three dimensions. Without understanding the nuances of each pigment and how they interact or compete with each other, it is inevitable that we will paint ourselves into a corner.

Understanding the pigment wheel is the key to understanding color.
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