This weekend I was in Tucson teaching two one day workshops billed as beginner and intermediate variations of the Watercolor technique. At the beginning of the day on Saturday, I confessed to my students that every workshop I teach is really an excuse to explore color and that these two workshops are specifically designed to play in the mud.
The rainbow colors get all the glory while most of the lowly mud colors do not even have names! By the end of the weekend everyone had a new appreciation for the importance, variety, and beauty of mud colors.
Here’s a new video with a sweet song by Jay Foreman and artwork by John Henry Falle that expresses my longing to discover the infinite range of colors that exist beyond the rainbow.
January 31, 2013 at 5:53 am
You are so right Ginger. There are many places in color space to explore. I love the complexity of rich, earth colors. And I’m growing more comfortable with earthy, soft pastels.
January 31, 2013 at 12:29 am
Wonderful, Maggie. When I was a kid and people asked me what my favorite color was, I always said, “All of them, except red.” And what I really found was that I loved combinations of colors. I love the interplay, the subtlety, the dynamic energy of gradients, contrasts, and yes even limited palettes. One of the best movements in polymer clay in recent years has been toward the mud colors. Works aren’t so much about brilliant spectral colors but about rich palettes and satisfying earth-based colors. I think many new clayers are a lot like the kid in the video. Once they realize there are colors beyond the packaged colors, their world opens up and they’re off!