The first thing that everyone is taught about mixing paints in art class/school is that the basic building blocks of a palette should be the three primary colors, and, in fact, the palette with just three primaries is sometimes called “The Color Theory Palette”. What color theory? Oh, the one believed in 300 years ago.
The bottom line and the take home message of this post is that the concept of primary, secondary, and tertiary colors is not useful to the painter in constructing a palette. A primary color palette is, in fact (at least to a painter), just one of many extremely limited palettes and not THE basic, rational palette at all. For example, one could use (in oil or acrylic) a palette of cadmium red, cadmium lemon yellow, and ultramarine blue (and white, therefore it wont work in watercolor) for plein air sketches. You would have to do a hell of a lot of mixing. There sure are no “convenience” paints here. Scott Christianson promotes this palette (his red is Varsari bright red). See his interview in Artist Daily here. But note he calls it a “limited palette” and admits to adding “a couple of grays.” Limited palettes are fun to use and usually produce pleasing (“harmonious”) paintings. It odd that he is impressed with the fact that the range of tones are limitless with a limited palette since that, in fact, is all you can achieve (e.g. not limitless hues.) See my “extremely limited” palette post here for more discussion on this point.
HERE’S HIS QUOTE: “AA: What colors are included in your palette?
- “SC: My palette has been reduced to three primaries—yellow, red, and blue—and white. I usually add a couple of grays as values to modify color and tone. Having employed both broad and limited palettes, I’ve come to realize that where harmony is concerned, more can be achieved with less color. Even with a limited palette, the range of tones attainable now seems endless. “
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The primary colors idea implies incorrectly that they (usually said to be “red, yellow, and blue”) mix to make secondary colors (green, orange, and violet). The secondary colors are said to mix to make tertiary colors (There are six tertiary colors: red-orange, yellow-orange, yellow-green, blue-green, blue-violet, and red-violet.). The three primaries do make the hues claimed by the theory after a fashion, but they are often very grayed down and just manage to show a bit of the hue one intended to mix.
I remember in Painting One when I was taking my MFA, the class was, in fact, given the task of mixing primaries to make secondary and tertiary colors. Of course, we couldn’t do it. At first I thought I just didn’t have the instructions or perhaps the talent to do so. Some of my classmates concentrated on making extremely neat color wheels with the terrible dull colors rather than achieving the expected results. The teacher, somehow, neglected to comment on our work (to our relief.) It was a truly crazy-making experience.
In the end, it is also said that all the colors we can see can be mixed by the three primary colors. This last statement is simply false. Yes, the yellow (whatever one it is) mixed with the blue (whatever it is) will make some sort of greenish color but not every green we can see. Just that one. And, if the green looks good, then the orange or the violet won’t look good and visa versa with the particular paints you’re chosen. As a result today it is best for the painter not to think of a hierarchy of colors. In fact, you could pick any three colors (hopefully somewhat separated from each other on the color wheel) and make a successful painting. For the craftsperson there are just a variety of materials, paints not colors, each having its own characteristics with which you must become familiar.
Parenthetically, “red, yellow, and blue” are not the best choices for primary colors. It’s a bit of a quibble given that the whole concept of primary colors is not of much value to a painter, but the primary colors as used in color printing are, in fact, red violet (magenta), yellow, and green-blue (cyan). Black, which is not even considered a color in the old theory, is usually included as well in printing. Two of these hues, magenta and cyan, are actually tertiary colors in the old color theory.
“Primary colors” implies, in addition to being able to mix all the other colors, that you cannot mix them from other pigments. In fact, a turquoise blue can be, and frequently is, mixed from ultramarine blue and phthalocyanine green (why pay for another hue) and a red can be mixed from cobalt violet and cadmium orange.
I think what’s so annoying about the primary palette idea is that it doesn’t take into account the wonderfully different qualities of the materials, the way some paint granulates, the way another paint can be lifted off, for example. It clearly wasn’t thought up by a painter. It’s academic knowledge at it’s worst. I can’t image that the people who thought it up ever tried to paint a picture with it.
In a recent blog post James Gurney reviews the color wheel (hue circle) and concludes with a post that suggest we think of 6 primary colors The post is here. He suggest combining the light primaries (RGB) with the print primaries CMY) to have yellow, red, magenta, blue, cyan, and green as the primaries. In his color wheel he mixes the colors in between as well. His hilarious memory aid for the six colors is “You ride my bus, cousin Gus.” More importantly he suggests that we start thinking of CYAN and MAGENTA as independent hues not variations of red and blue.
The brain has to synchronize various daily rythyms (like sleep wake patterns). Interestingly it does so by using cyan colored light, that is it distinguishes between blue and cyan. Some cataract lens block blue light because of the not very well proved belief that it increases the likelihood of macular degeneration.
This idea of Gurney’s has led me to think why YELLOW stands alone. In fact, a very light or lemon yellow (they are not the same thing: lemon yellow is a green-yellow) can’t be created from a deeper yellow in watercolor very easily. That is, more water in the mixture is not very satisfying as a way of lightening a strong mid yellow. I notice that some palettes (for example, Charles Reid’s) includes two yellows, one regular one and one either light or lemon yellow. I think this is a good idea, myself, and makes the primary color concept even more irrelevant for a painter. So I would add LEMON to the rest.
There is another type of primary palette used by English watercolorists and made popular by Edward (Ted) Wesson. This is a palette with three blues (thalo, Cobalt, and Untramarine, and sometimes Prussian blue), two yellows (Cadmium yellow, and raw sienna), two reds (light red –Winsor Newton, and burnt sienna) along with burnt umber. Cadmium yellow is seldom used and when mixed with any other paint it quickly grays, so it is kind of a dead color palette. The WN light red is PR101 (the same pigment used to color bricks and lots of other reds). If any other paints are added by this English group, they tend to be convenience paints for making grays like Payne’s gray, raw umber, Sepia, etc. That’s how I would categorize Wesson’s addition of burnt umber to his “multiple primary” palette.
I actually like the idea of a multiple primary palette with all the yellow you can find, and all the blues and reds, but none of the so-called secondary or tertiary colors. That would, of course, give you the magentas and cyans. When you throw in a couple of convenience colors that make mixing grays easy like the umbers, I think you can do rather harmonious paintings.
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