The New Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain (50 page)

Those of you familiar with color wheels will notice that I have used the usual order for colors on the wheel: yellow at the top, violet at the bottom; the cool colors of green, blue-green, blue, and blue-violet on the right side; the warm hues of yellow, yellow-orange, orange, red-orange, and red on the left (see Figure 11-2).

I believe that this is the correct placement in terms of the complicated crossover system of the brain, the visual system, and the language of art. The left side of an image is addressed by the (usually) dominant right eye, which is controlled by the left hemisphere (stay with me; it is complicated!). In the language of art, the left side of an image carries the connotations of dominance, aggression, and forward movement. The right side, scanned after the left side, is addressed by the left eye, controlled by the right brain. The right side of an image, in the language of art, carries the connotations of passivity, defensiveness, and blocked movement.

In this zigzag fashion, the left hemisphere, right eye, and the left side of the color wheel are linked to the sun, daylight, and warmth—and also to dominance, aggression, and forward movement. Conversely, the right hemisphere, left eye, and right side of the wheel are linked to the moon, nighttime, and coolness—and thus also to passivity, defensiveness, and distance. Most color wheels are oriented in this fashion, apparently purely on intuition. Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky, one of the great colorists of art history, put his intuitions into words in the margin quotation.

The purpose, then, of constructing the color wheel is to set in your mind which colors are opposite each other on the wheel. Blue is opposite orange, red is opposite green, yellow-green is opposite red-violet. These opposites are called complements. The root of the word “complement” is “complete.” This means that complements form the closed system previously proposed by Dr. Peter Smith as a requirement for an esthetic response. Perceived together in proper relationship, complements seem to satisfy the needs of R-mode and the visual system for completion.

You can use your color wheel to practice determining which hues are complements. This knowledge should be learned so thoroughly that it becomes as automatic as 2 + 2 = 4.

Before you begin, please read all of the instructions.

I will use the Degas drawing on pink paper (Figure 11-6) as the basis for instructions, but please choose any subject that appeals to you: a group of objects for a still-life drawing, a person who will pose for a figure drawing or a portrait, another reproduction of a master drawing, a photograph that appeals to you, or a self-portrait (the artist always has one available model!).

An important point: have confidence in your color choices! Guided by some basic L-mode knowledge of the structure of color (for example, the use of complements), your R-mode will know when color is right. Within the guidelines, follow your intuition. Try out the hues on the back of the paper. Then say to yourself, “Does that feel right?” and listen to what you feel. Don’t argue with yourself—I should say, with your L-mode. We have limited your choices to three: the paper and two pencils. Given these limits, you are sure to produce harmonious color.

Bear in mind that color most often “goes wrong” when students without knowledge of color use too many hues. They often throw together a variety of hues, chosen at random from the color wheel. Such combinations are difficult—often impossible—to balance and unify, and even beginning students sense that something isn’t working. This is the reason for limiting the palette in these first exercises to a few hues and their related lights and darks. And I encourage you to continue to limit your palette until you have wider experience with color.

Having said that, I will reverse the thought and suggest that at some point, you may want to go wild with color, throwing everything together to see what happens. Buy a sheet of brightly colored paper and use every color you have on it. Create discordant color. Then try to pull it together, perhaps with dark or dull colors. You may be able to make it work—or you may like it in its discordant state! Much of contemporary art uses discordant color in very inventive ways. Let me emphasize, however, that you should attempt discordant color by design and not by mistake. Your R-mode will always perceive the difference, perhaps not immediately, but over a period of time. Ugly color is not the same as discordant color. Discordant color is not the same as harmonious color. For these first exercises, we shall concentrate on creating harmonious color, because it more readily provides basic knowledge about color.

Now, to continue:

When you have finished: Pin your drawing to a wall, stand back, and enjoy your first small step into color. Some student drawings using colored pencil are shown in the color section. As you see, very few colors were used in each of the drawings. Student Thu Ha Huyung used the largest number of colors (four plus black and white) in her
Girl in a Flowered Hat
(Figure 11-22). The colors she used were canary yellow and ultramarine blue (near complements), magenta and dark green (near complements), and black and white (opposites).

Thu Ha’s color is harmonious because it is balanced and colors are repeated from area to area. (See Josef Albers’s statement in the margin of page 239.) The pale magenta of the lips is repeated in the pink flower. The green of the leaves reappears in the hair. The blue of the blouse reappears in the eyes and hat. The black is used for the shadow-shapes, and the white heightens the lights. And, finally, the yellow of the hair is a lighter value of the ochre paper that forms the ground and middle value.

If you haven’t yet tried a colored-pencil portrait on a colored ground, I urge you to find a model or to draw a self-portrait, following the suggestions in the margin. Because the colored ground so beautifully supplies the middle-value tones, you are sure to enjoy this project. With the middle-value ground in place, it almost seems that the drawing is half-complete before you start. Recall that in Chapter Ten your rubbed-graphite ground supplied the middle-value tones, the eraser provided the lights, and the darkest dark of your pencil supplied the dark shadows. The transition from that drawing to drawing in color on a colored ground is a very short step.

You might also enjoy trying a cityscape similar to the student drawing
The Arrow Hotel
in Figure 11-24. This drawing was the result of an assignment to my students to “Go out and find a truly ugly corner.” (Regrettably, ugly corners are all too easy to find in most of our cities.) Using the perceptual skills of seeing edges, spaces, and relationships of angles and proportions, students were directed to draw exactly what they saw—including signs, lettering, everything—placing great emphasis on negative space. The project was completed by following the directions for the cityscape provided below.