Qualities

The psychological properties referred to here are essentially of comparative rather than absolute value; they are of a subjective nature. We agree, of course, that there are light hues and dark hues, intense colors and weak colors, and so forth; we describe some colors as "warm" and others as "cool" we say that some colors tend to advance and others to recede, that some colors, no matter how applied, seem opaque, while others seem transparent; we describe some as "heavy," some as "light" [in weight], some as "moist," others as "dry." So there is often a great deal of shared response, despite the fact that each of us is seeing these colors and color arrangements through unique optical apparatuses connected to unique memory banks, life experiences, ways of ordering thoughts and feelings.

This will seem the barest introduction to the captivating complexities of color. But to merely read about color is not to appreciate its range or subtleties. A purely mental image of a color or a color scheme is probably the most uncertain of all images: One has to really look at colors, mix them and arrange them in order to assess how greatly they affect one another. Therefore, the problem of color perception must be taken up at first hand in the series of studies that follow. The "problem," however, does not end with these studies: It arises as a challenge in every creative act involving color, in the manner of a love affair.

If it is true that there is no color system that serves the artist to any great degree in his or her studio, what then does the artist rely upon? If the Impressionists of the 1870s were not inflexible theoreticians, what handy set of principles did they evolve? What did Matisse and Pierre Bonnard [1867-1947] understand about the ways of color? Was van Gogh merely a wild, intuitive colorist, devoid of theoretical understanding? What did great colorists of a more distant past--Egyptian muralists, Medieval decorators, stained-glass makers, miniaturists, and enamelists--understand about it? Did Piero della Francesca, Jan van Eyck, and El Greco work entirely by instinct?

Perhaps a simple diagram that can be kept in mind, along with a few functional principles relating to it , is all any artists needs, aside from months and years of practical experience with color. The musician, in spite of the evanescent nature of sound, is in a more fortunate relationship to his art than is the visual artist: the "Language" of music has a mathematically defined vocabulary. Successive intervals of a regular order form scales and thereby melodies, and combinations of intervals arranged vertically form chords of predictable quality and effect. The music student must still study traditional harmony and counterpoint, even if he or she should choose to dismiss some or all of the European musical heritage. He or she will probably rely on some understanding of "approved" acoustics, the predescribed tuning, the intervals of scales, of intervallic combinations and processions, and of musical notations, in order to transfer musical thought to paper. The rough equivalent of these musical intervals, for the artist, would be, first, then natural intervals of the color circle, and, second, the kind of "color chords," color schemes or combinations, he may wish to create with them. [9] But since colors tend to resist formulation according to strict mathematical orders, and so many unpredictables enter into their use, the artist is often left with little but instinct and personal experience to guide him--ironically, in an age when so much of a technical nature is being written about color and color perception. There is no reason to expect the color wheel to help beyond a certain point; and there is no sense in making one, learning about it, remembering it, unless it serves some useful purpose. [pp. 90-92]