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In his 1976 essay “The Dialectics of Color,” Dr. Peter Smith states: “Since the right hemisphere has a strong interest in the way things fit together to form a closed system, it may be said to be a decisive factor in the esthetic response.” This closed system may be what artists speak of as unified, harmonious color—that is, color in relationships that are locked into balance. Perhaps R-mode recognizes the satisfying wholeness of properly unified color and reacts with a pleasurable sense of “Yes. That’s it. That’s right.”

The converse is also true: R-mode recognizes unbalanced or disunified color arrangements and perhaps longs for unity and the missing parts of the closed system. An individual may experience this longing as vague dislike—a sense that something is missing or out of place.

R-mode has another important role in color: seeing which combination of colors has produced a particular color. Given a range of grays, for example, R-mode sees which one is warmed with red, which is cooled with blue.

Learning the basics of color

Nearly everyone is interested in color, yet most people have surprisingly little comprehensive knowledge about it. We often take it for granted that we know enough about color to know what we like, and we feel that’s sufficient. Yet knowing something of the enormous body of knowledge about color increases pleasure in color, as in almost every subject. In the following pages, you will add a few color skills to your newly acquired basic perceptual skills of drawing.

Something odd happens when a student of drawing begins to add color to the gray, black, and white of drawing. No matter how satiated by our modern color-loaded surroundings, students focus on color as though seeing it for the first time, almost with the naive pleasure of children. And color in drawing does indeed add a tremendous emotional charge to drawing. For an example of this, compare Edgar Degas’s drawing of the ballet dancer on pink paper (Figure 11-6) with the almost identical Degas drawing on page 157 of Chapter Eight. But I must caution you: I am not saying that color makes a drawing better. It doesn’t. Color changes drawing, adding an element of drama and verve that moves it closer to painting.

For the basic exercises described in this chapter, you will need to buy a few new drawing supplies. I will add to the list of supplies as each technique is introduced.

First, buy a set of colored pencils. “Prismacolor” is a good brand, but there are many others. Prismacolor offers a complete set of sixty pencils, or you can buy individual colors. I suggest the following:

black

white

ultramarine blue

Copenhagen blue

dark green

canary yellow

scarlet red

magenta

sienna brown

dark brown

sepia

burnt umber

yellow ochre

lemon yellow

flesh

olive green

vermilion

violet

slate gray

sand

warm gray light

warm gray medium

cream

orange

Also, buy six sheets of colored paper at least 9” x 12” or larger. Construction paper is fine, or you may prefer another type of paper. Any colored paper that is not too smooth or shiny will do. Avoid bright, intense colors. Choose instead soft green, gray,

“Perhaps the most important point I can make is that you are not to think of painting as something separate from drawing.”

—Kimon Nicolaides

The Natural Way to Draw,

1941

Some basic information about color:

The three main attributes of color are:

hue

value

intensity

Hue is simply the name of the color. This is the L-mode attribute.

Value is the lightness or darkness of a hue, relative to the value scale. Value is an R-mode attribute.

Intensity is the brightness or dullness of a hue, relative to the utmost brightness available in pigments—generally color straight out of the tube. Intensity is an R-mode attribute.

To balance color, remember the following:

Every hue has its complement.

For every hue of a given intensity, there is the same hue at the opposite intensity.

For every hue of a given value, there is the same hue at the opposite value.

sand, blue,