Tuesday, May 24, 2016

Exploring (Exploding!) complementary color combinations

Yellow Backbeat With A Rising Cadence
8"x16" Acrylics on canvas panel $125
To purchase this painting, click HERE.

After finishing this new one last night, I'm thinking I'm just going to stay with blue and orange for a while. The moods of these last two paintings are so different that I'm wondering just how much range you have within a two-member complementary color scheme. It was a real revelation to stop thinking of pairing single colors in favor of pairing their whole families. (Thank you again, Robert Burridge.) Not just orange, but yellow-orange, red-orange, gold, and citrine (green-orange), paired with true blue, pthalo blue, cyan, greenish blue, violet-blue. Take all those shades and multiply them by a few different values, from pale to darkest, and you have a forest of colors to play with.

It's like throwing a party for your favorite couple, and inviting all their interesting friends to come too.

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