Color Interactions

Our eyes are funny things. We can only take in a certain amount of information when we look at something. Above is an example of tricking our eyes in a color interaction study by Josef Albers. The smallest squares are the same color exactly, but when they are put against different backgrounds they appear to be different. Throughout the entire color exploration section in this semester I found that I made my eyes realize what was there instead of just assuming what I thought was there. For example I had t train my eyes to see a pure gray when we were mixing grays. A slight tint that was too warm or too cool was what I aimed to differentiate. Before that in the activity where we had to find steps between tints and shades was a test on my eyes to see contrast instead of what I thought it should be in my mind.

In the color interaction activities all that I have learned about color is reversed. I have learned how to train my eyes to see color steps and variations of color and know what the content was of those specific colors. In this activity, I had to trick myself and use color interactions to disprove that my eyes were really trained.

Color Theory- The Chromatic Gray

Our assignment was to use our basic color wheel and non-color wheel colors and mix together the complements, or at least what seemed to be compliments of each other. these colors at some proportion should have canceled each other's hue at maximum intensity to make a neutral gray. The whole process was overall a learning experience. I found that different hues were a lot stronger than others. Between Phthalocyanine Blue (Green shade) and the Ultramarine Blue, the latter needed a lot more paint with it's compliment to be effective. The fact that it was a green shade for the Phthalocyanine Blue made one row completely green until the end where I got to neutralize the gray.

My earlier research on how gray acts like blue or purple really helped me be aware of how to look for an actual neutral gray instead of a cooler gray that also looked correct. I found it was a lot easier to identify when a gray was too warm. In my prior research I found that blue and purples are overall stronger hues since their chroma has more steps than the warmer colors. There maximum intensity seems darker and acts like black would when added to white. The human eye doesn't care that black isn't on the color wheel, it just perceives a darker cooler color. This is why it was difficult to identify if my grays were in fact neutral instead of blueish.

The last part of our assignment was to paint a chromatic gray painting completely silver object. I found it extremely difficult to match up grays that were warmer or cooler according to what I saw. Also it was difficult to outline areas of different gray values when it came to small sections and points of the overhead light reflecting on my flask. The contrast of grays was also hard to capture. Overall it was two tedious activities but I enjoyed them.