Complements That Have Already Made People Feel Good

This post took me far too long to do, partially because it took me forever on my dial-up to access all the links people had given me and partially because half the links didn't properly work and I had to work my butt off to figure out where I was actually supposed to go. But I've finally gotten around to it, and hopefully this will serve the purpose of both illustrating some complements at work and also giving some shout-outs to some of my blog readers who make this blog a better place with their comments.

Those who are just appearing can find the original post on complements here. I asked blog readers to send me links to pieces (of theirs or from other people) who intentionally used complements. So here they are. If you click on them, it should take you back to the original page the art appeared on.

Here are the contributors:

Vivien Blackburn. Her seascape is using blue/orange complements and while it's pretty, I cannot emphasize strongly enough that y'all should head over to her blog and look at her other stuff, because some of it is positively transcendental.

Jo Castillo. I love this artist because she has a sort of unflagging, indefatigable web presence that is always inspiring. Her pears are a green/ red complement pair. Whoo pears pairs! I'm enjoying following her sketches on her blog these days . . . makes me want to doodle and sketch more.

Casey Klahn. His blog, The Colorist, is always informative and well written, and he does some amazing stuff with pastels. He's also got another helpful blog on the nitty gritties of art fairs that I recommend to art fair newbies. His piece here is using pinks and light greens -- yes, people, those are complements as well.

Karen Mathison Schmidt. Her cat piece here uses blues and oranges, and it is nice . . . but not as nice as some of the really loose, blocky pieces on her blog. She has this one that I really want!

Barbie Bud. If for nothing else, I would love Barbie for her wonderful comments! But she's a promising artist too -- her piece here is blues and oranges (seems to be a popular set of complements). If you look at her blog, check out her use of darks . . . we could all learn something from that understated palette.

Meg Lyman. Check out this quirky guy! Red/ Green -- see how powerful that color combination is? Meg is a very competent artist with a fascinating peculiar style that I can't seem to look away from. :D


Melanie Rich. I actually hadn't visited her website before today, but I'm glad I did. She's got a cool, blocky style that appeals to me and her fishy piece fits into our complement theme as well - more orange/blue popping.

Christy Branston. At first I thought this piece didn't really illustrate complements well, but then I read her explanation again: "Everything seemed really dull until I read about combining yellow with purple, so I tried putting purple on the white flowers, and that made the flower pop right out from the yellowish leaves." And it's true. It did work.

And of course, thanks to Katherine and Cooper for their suggestions (Cooper, I couldn't get your Wolf Kahn link to work), and to Dhara for recommending I take a look at the Munsell Color System, which is another version of the color wheel worth looking at. I actually like his complements better and think that they're what I tend towards anyway.

Complements Make People Feel Good

"Royal" - work in progress, 16 x 20" colored pencil on board

Notice that I said "complements" with an E not "compliments" with an I. I thought I would talk today about complements, because I'm using a lot of them on my latest portrait commission (above, vaguely crappy photo).

Back when I was first starting out as an artist, I found color theory about as meaningful as the lyrics to a Foo Fighters song. It seemed like a pointless rationalization of something that ought to be intuitive. Like coming up with a formula for the perfect kiss, or drawing a diagram on how to create a great symphony.

Sigh. Like so many other things I thought when I was starting out, I was wrong. Art is intuitive, but it is also technical. And you should know the rules so that you can break them. Color theory is something everyone ought to know. So. Behold the color wheel. It's probably familiar enough to you that you're saying "so what?"

Everything what, that's what. You'll need to know it to find complementary colors. I have it memorized by now, but I still remember when I didn't. Ah, I was such a young grasshopper.

WHAT ARE COMPLEMENTARY COLORS?
Complementary colors are colors directly opposite from each other on the color wheel. Yellow-purple. Orange-blue. Green-red. Etc. You can have as many nuances in complementary colors as you have shades of a color.

WHAT GOOD ARE COMPLEMENTARY COLORS?
When used intentionally and thoughtfully, they can subconsciously change the way a viewer sees your painting, to emphasize a subject, create a mood, or create depth (just like composition works subtly behind the scenes). There are two main ways to use them: combining them and using them next to each other in their pure forms.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I COMBINE COMPLEMENTARY COLORS?
If you combine (as in mix) two colors opposite each other on the color wheel, you'll dull down the resulting mix. For instance, let's say I have a beautiful yellow color that I'm painting an elephant in my portrait (don't ask questions. Just imagine.). I need to create a sense of depth on this elephant. Something subtle, to indicate that its butt is farther away from the viewer than the honkin' trunk. (did anyone notice that an elephant is like a Porsche? Both of them have the trunks in the front?) I could theoretically put in a bit of a purple into the yellow. It would gray down the yellow and push that yellow backwards in the image.

Or let's say you're painting some grass. You have a pretty nasty grass green color that comes straight out of the paint tube. Mix in some red and I guarantee you'll get a color that looks green but has a subtle depth.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I USE COMPLEMENTARY COLORS NEXT TO EACH OTHER?
Two complementary colors put next to each other but not combined will make each of the colors seem more vibrant. Blue and gold will become beautifully blue and gold. Green and red will be freakin' Christmas on steroids. Purple and yellow . . . you get the idea. James Gurney has a few illustrations of this on his blog (which as I mentioned before, I highly recommend). And you can see how I chose complementary colors for my portrait. The sky is all blues and purple and the ground is all yellow and orange. The effect in person is an idealized summer day where the color springs off the board.

This is a good thing.

If any of my readers can come up with good examples of paintings that use complementaries (even if they're theirs), please post them in the comments and I'll pull the links out to put in an actual post.