Color Body Painting Project

Instead of painting nine color compositions in monochromatic, complimentary, and analogous schemes, our group decided to incorporate performance art with color. We chose to do this because all of us had already done something very similar to this color mixing exercise in high school, so we then proposed the body paint idea. We used non toxic tempera paint to paint color compositions onto our skin in varying arrangements. We designated each of our four group members for a role; Chris would be monochromatic, Bart would be analogous, and Paulette and I would be complimentary. We designated that I would get the paints by next week, and then that class we would paint each other, and present it near the end of class.
I bought the paints which totaled about thirteen dollars, and we will then split the cost between the four of us. The next class we began to sketch out what we planned to paint on each other. We painted Bart first, and decided that analogous seemed to be the most "wild", or varied, color scheme, so we painted him with both geometric and organic shapes, including facial warpaint, in a variety of red analogous colors. The next up was Paulette and myself, since we were both the complimentary scheme. For this composition we used bands of tape to section off our arms from the elbow to the hand. On my left arm the band closest to my elbow we painted full green, and for each band getting closer to my hand, we added more red paint to the green, finally reaching a muddy brown at my hand. We did the same to Paulette except with red on her arm. The final person was Chris, who we used a monochromatic composition on. We wanted to make it very geometric, so we used removable tape to section off portions of his back according to basic anatomical structure. For example, we taped about twelve small squares down a line on top of his spine, and three triangular "ribs" on either side. As Paulette taped, I painted varying shades and tints of red. After we were all complete we stood in front of the white wall to present it. Paulette stood to my right and we both help our arms so that our fists met in the center, where the color was exactly the same, and Chris turned around and stood facing the wall. I feel that this exercise helped me in my Fine Art major because it not only taught me more about color, but also about performance art. In fact I found this to be more helpful in learning about performance art than the activities we completed last semester. Overall, I really enjoyed it and found it to be fun and educational project.

Color Mixing Blog

As I sat at my desk mixing seven different shades of yellow mixed with violet, I was definately wondering how this would really help me in my art school career. I figured that if we are already in art college, certainly everyone already knows how to mix color. As I continued to mix each different shade of yellow, it became more apparent that this activity did in fact serve a useful purpose. I began to realize that this was actually somewhat helpful in learning about the interactions of colors. Watching the yellow turn to a progressivley more repulsive shade of brown allowed me to see the exact progression on the hue when it is mixed with its compliment.
I picked the color yellow for my color mixing project because it is my least favorite color out of the primaries, so I wouldn't feel as bad wasting so much paint. After completing the assignment, my opinion really hasn't changed greatly. I think i dislike yellow less, but it is still nowhere close to my favorite color. Yellow just doesn't hold any appeal for me at all, maybe because it always seems that unpleasant items are yellow in color. Things such as peeling old wall paper, lemons, plastic raincoats, and greasy potato chips, just to name a few. It's basically such an obnoxious color, and it usually dominates anything in a color scheme unless used very sparingly.

Color wheel blog

After completing my acrylic paint version of the Munsell color wheel, I took the time to research other color wheel organizations, since the Munsell system is often said to be flawed. I found several models online, including a cube, a cone, and several graphs. I found the double cone model, also called HSV, to be the most easily understandable. HSV stands for Hue, Saturation, and Lightness, which is exactly what the model demonstrates. It has a central vertical axis which represents value, and at the top is pure white, and at the very bottom is pure black, with middle grey in the very middle. Around this middle grey mark the double cone extends to its widest points, and at the very edge of that widest circle each hue or color is at its full saturation. The further in towards the center you move, the less saturated each hue becomes as it moves toward the middle grey.
Also, as you move down towards the bottom of the upside down cone, the hues become less saturated, and darker since it is moving towards pure black. The opposite applies for moving up in the direction of the top of the cone, where the value is becoming lighter. These factors provide a clear explanation for the naming of this model. This model was developed in the the 1970's for the purpose of being visually comprehendable, unlike many of the graphs. It took Munsell's theory and built off of it, and it is still in use today especially for computer graphics.