Color in Art - Hue, Intensity, Temperature, Value

Color is one element of art. Hue, intensity, temperature and value are all components of color. Some authors and teachers say that value is so important they consider it separately from color and as a different element. I was taught that value is a component of color; it affects other components.

Hue is the name of a color; yellow, red, blue, etc. I named these 3 hues because they are primary hues/colors. They cannot be made by any other hues but they can make other hues. These are called secondary hues; they are made of 2 primary hues/colors. Yellow and red make orange; yellow and blue make green; blue and red make violet. Tertiary or intermediate colors are made by mixing one primary and one secondary color; tertiary colors are red-violet, red-orange, yellow-orange, yellow-green, blue-green and blue-violet. This is the standard 12 hue color wheel. There are other types of color wheels. Black and white are not hues.

Intensity also called chroma or saturation is the brightness or dullness of a color. Pure red is bright. However if you add another color, i.e. green, the red will be less bright.

Temperature is the warmth or coolness of a color. Orange is a very warm color; red and yellow are also warm colors. Blue is a very cool color; green and violet are also cool colors.

Value is the lightness or darkness of a color. If you add white to red you create pink and the red is lighter with the white (tint with white). The pink will also be less bright than the red. You could also add yellow to the red. Since yellow is the lightest hue on the color wheel, you will lighten the red and also make it less intense. Violet is the darkest color on the color wheel. If you were to add black to red, this new color (shade with black) would be darker than the red; and less intense. If you added violet to the red, the color will be darker, cooler and less intense.

This is very limited information about color. I have not discussed complements, neutrals, analogous colors, etc.

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Triad Colours, Still Life Art Painting, "Rose, Vase, Gourds, Pumpkin"

Rose, Vase, Gourds, Pumpkin

Acrylic on wrapped canvas on wood stretcher bars

8 by 10 by 0.75 inches, 20.4 by 25.5 by 1.9 cm

I wanted to mainly use a triad color scheme. This triad is red-violet, blue-green and yellow-orange. A triad colour scheme has 3 colors equally spaced from each other on the color wheel. I was also interested in the lyrical movment of the rose's petals.

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Art Study of Glazing, Scumbling & Impasto - Holman Hunt

I previously wrote about certain techniques I viewed at the Art Gallery of Ontario’s Holman Hunt exhibit. I believe the artist painted the local colours, i.e. colour of dress, first. (This did not include the manner of painting faces or skin.) It then appeared as if Hunt laid darker transparent glazes over the local colour to make the transparent shadow. He might have used blue, black or crimson to paint a transparent glaze over a red dress. The artist scumbled a lighter colour over the local colour of the light side of the dress creating a semi transparent, translucent colour. This means that the lighter scumbled colour would also show particles of the local colour underneath the scumble. If there was a highlight, the artist would place a lighter opaque thick impasto stroke.



[Click on title of this post to read more about Hunt. You can also click on my link to the Art Gallery of Ontario to read more about the exhibit.]





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Art Study of Fallen Figures & 3 Dimensional Quality

I went to the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) to examine works by Peter Paul Rubens. This small exhibit features the painting, The Massacre of the Innocents, that was a gift to the AGO from Ken Thomson. The exhibit also includes the paintings, Samson and Delilah, on loan from the National Gallery, London, and The Entombment, on loan from the National Gallery of Canada. These paintings are early works by Rubens. While Michelangelo drew figure studies from dissections, Rubens drew figure studies from sculptures. Tetrode’s sculpture, The Horse Trainer, is in the exhibit. I also draw figure studies from sculptures in the AGO. I studied the paintings, Samson and Delilah and The Entombment, examining the techniques used by Rubens to emphasize the fallen figures and at the same time maintain the 3 dimensional quality or form of the figures. In Samson and Delilah, I saw that from the top of Delilah’s head and moving down and over Samson, the direction is from top left to bottom right. Therefore, we see a downward movement. If the direction was from bottom left to top right we would see a soaring movement. This is because most of us read from left to right and therefore enter a painting from the left. In The Entombment, the white shroud around the Christ figure and the man on the right side, bent over holding Christ’s legs, repeat the downward movement of Christ’s body. This also adds to the movement of Christ. Rubens also used other techniques to emphasize the paintings’ fallen figures. Light and shadow create the 3 dimensional qualities of form/figures. If you link the form shadows, i.e. the shadow on the arm of Samson, the figure will obtain more roundness.

[Click on the title of this post to go to the Ruben's Virtual Gallery where you can see all 3 paintings.]

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Study of Techniques-Pre Raphaelite Art Exhibit

I like to go to the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) to study and learn from the works of other artists. Currently the AGO has an exhibit of works from Holman Hunt and other artists of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. I was able to study the structural compositions of the paintings. I was also able to study the artists use of glazing (transparent layers of paint), scumbling (semi transparent, translucent layers), and impasto (thick opaque paint). This was my primary objective and I came away with knowledge of how the artists used these techniques to achieve their artistic goals. Of course, I was able to view their use of other elements, i.e. light, colour, etc.


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Sunlight & Sky, Original Fine Art Painting, "Barn and Trees"

Barn and Trees
Acrylic on wrapped canvas on wood stretcher bars
8 by 10 inches, 20.4 by 25.5 cm

I wanted to paint the warm light shining on the barn and the reflection of the sky on the roof. The cast shadows of the trees lead the viewer into the painting.

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