Battle of the Greens-Understanding Light and Color
July 1, 2009
I’ve got to warn you that this article is little left brained! I know, to more than just a few artists, left brain activity is not high on the priority list. But the truth is that art is only possible when there is a collaboration between the left brain and right brain. The Art of painting is an expression of creative intelligence (right brain activity) that cannot be separated from the craft of painting (left brain activity). Indeed the more our understanding of craft becomes second nature the more it’s problems of execution stay out of the way of creativity. And thus, the closer we are to making art. As William F Reese says in The Painter’s Process, “craft is to painting as carpentry is to architecture and typing is to writing.” Learning the craft of painting is difficult enough that it is either confused with art or dispensed with altogether. When it is dispensed with altogether those results on canvas are also, often confused with art. This article is for those of you willing to apply your left brain to the subject of color.
Non-native, Fort Desoto
For landscape painters the color green can be most difficult to master, partially because there is so much of it out there. Sometimes there is so much green in our chosen location that it becomes overwhelming. Florida Landscape Artist Larry Moore aptly calls this scenario,”the battle of the greens”. The painting challenge becomes bringing variety to an over abundance of the one color. For plein air painters, who often use somewhat limited palettes, it is particularly challenging because we are not carrying a plethora tubed greens, blues and yellows from which to choose. To make matters tougher the green we mix from our blue and yellow is often too acidic looking. Sure we can neutralize the green by adding the compliment or by using tube grays but sometimes that doesn’t offer enough variety to satisfy either. So what’s an artist to do?
Perhaps we can gain further insight by looking into the physics of light. The primary colors of light are red, blue and green. (This is different than the primary colors of paint which are red, blue and yellow). The secondary colors of light, meaning the colors achieved by mixing the primary colors of light, are cyan, yellow and magenta. Cyan is the compliment of red, yellow the compliment of blue and magenta the compliment of green. According to the subtractive principle of light we see the color green when all the colors of light except magenta are reflected off of an object and back to our eye. So green is the whole spectrum minus magenta. Likewise red is the spectrum minus cyan and blue is minus yellow.
How do we make practical use of this in our paintings? We learn to mix colors optically as well as on our palette. For instance, when engaged in the battle of the greens, we can juxtapose colors next to each other. We can also uderpaint the green areas in sunlight with a variety of neutral reds and yellows, rusts and ochres, everything but purple (magenta). Then try using a variety of purples in your tree trunks and branches as well as the rocks beneath the trees. They will immediately separate from the greens and contribute a naturalness to the colors in your painting. In the shadows use a variety of blues and blue greens to contrast with above rusts and ochers. In fact, knowledge of this subtractive principle will not only aid your painting but inform and validate your seeing. Which is of course is a skill central to all painting.
It is evident that well known artist and teacher Emile Gruppe understood this principle, too. In his book, Gruppe On Painting, he talks about underpainting skies according to the relative location of the sun. If the sun was off to one side Gruppe underpainted with orange, if behind him he underpainted with red, if facing him he underpainted with yellow. He was setting up an optical vibration, the effectiveness of which can be explained by the subtractive principle of light.
This article was based on material presented in William F. Reese’s book, The Painter’s Process, which I highly recommend as a worthwhile addition to your library. I hope these thoughts and insights inform your left brain in a way that make it a better painting partner for your right brain. Keep painting, observing and studying. You will grow artistically in direct proportion to the effort you supply in these areas.
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This is indeed helpful information. You do battle greens here. And when you are building up grasses, for instance, or bushes, and you are going for the “threes” to make things turn or grow up then you really have to watch those acid greens. The further south you go in Florida, the more you have to watch the acidity in all your colors.
Sarasota, being sub tropical, is harder to paint for me on a bright sunny day then St. Petersburg. The aqua, the brilliant emeralds. and the citrus greens just look like bad postcards…even if they really do look like that!…if you paint them like that. You are always toning things down here.
This article will really help me think about how to best do this. Thanks Robert.
I would love to own that painting!