You’ll find these pastel colored, half-timered houses in Normandy were I was this summer. I’m always on the look for color, used in a special way. And in this region I didn’t have to look very far as they were just around every corner.
Every moment of our lives we are surrounded by color. It is ‘a common thing’ and we are used to its appearance, maybe take it for granted, and we easily can forget about its beauty and the impact it has on our lives emotionally. It is however one of our senses and it deserves more attention.
This morning a Robin was hopping through the garden, and I immediately saw its red breast showing up. The vibrant red/orange is something we can not deny. The Robin has no idea of his vibrant presence and think it can hide in the bushes without being seen. Only the idea is so endearing.
It’s natures colors that moves me most, all its hues are countless. And natures colors are never dull. I believe that every color has its vibrancy, colors can strengthen or weaken each other by placed next to each other. We can look at color in several ways, psychic, emotional, technical or scientific, I wrote about it in another post, and yet it is almost impossible to describe what you feel about one specific color. There are always two sides of a story, and that’s the same when talking about color. Which makes it to one of the most difficult subjects when it comes to choosing.
Every day again and again, I feel inspired by colors. Besides the fact that I work professionally with color, it feeds my creative soul. But I was given a push to the movement to start ‘Hundred Days of Color’ when observing the stunning colors of the Hydrangeas in the past few weeks. They start blooming in July in the most beautiful colors in many shades. Maybe the fact that, in Autumn, every other colors of nature begin to fade and these Hydrangea colors stand out so beautifully, is the reason that I feel touched by their beauty in another dimension. That I am a color addict doesn’t need any further explanation, it’s quite clear that color is more than a visible appearance to me, every color moves me and each of them in their specific way.
Throughout time my preference of color changes, the way I approach color changes, but the impact colors has in my life didn’t change. Let’s say I see and feel through colors. When I started to explore color professionally I did a lot of research, wrote about it, and as it is a natural act for me to work with colors I am interested in the way it affects people emotionally. Why do we feel more attracted to one color than the other. I can not speak for others, but to begin with, I would like to speak for myself. I am asked so often about my use of color so why not document more about this subject. So I am starting today with this project of Hundred Days of Color with no other intention than to express my perception of color and trying to beware of what I experience on an emotional level. To be continued…..
I love just sitting, apparently doing nothing and stare in the distance, musing about all sort of creative thoughts that wander my mind. All these things that add another dimension to my life since my children are grown up, have children of their own and need me in another way than when they were younger. The stream of creative thoughts that never ends, I can’t keep up with it and often feels like chaos. Until the moment I start drawing or painting, when everything seems to fall into place.
Most of the time my desk is cluttered with all kinds of supplies and paraphernalia. I love to be surrounded with little things like shell and pebbles or a beautiful find of an antique shop. The display of these little treasures changes when time passes by and they are replaced by other things. To me they have stories of their own which they want to tell me. I draw or paint them or I just enjoy them for being such little beauties.
I can’t get enough of Hydrangeas, seen for the first time while being on holidays in Brittany when I was a little girl. Those big bushes of color in all shades of blue and pink make me wonder and marvel. When I tried to grow my own I preferred the blue ones, being a lover of blue for whole my life. But I didn’t succeed, they all turned pink in the end. Of course I appreciated their attempt and beauty and I didn’t mind at all, being always impressed by their ability to bloom in such marvelous way. They need lots of water, don’t like drought and heat but besides that you can in fact ignore them, I believe that’s what they want.
This year we had the most beautiful blue ones I only dreamed of in the past, the blue was so very intense, I couldn’t do them justice while painting them. So I made pictures, lots of pictures to enjoy them throughout wintertime. And then, this month, when Autumn showed up, they turned colors in such a magical way, the blue became all kinds of different colors, and in many shades. Again I took pictures, of which I would love to share some of them with you.
Everything exists of shadow and light, sometimes it’s vibrant and full of color, sometimes colors are fading away. It doesn’t say anything about the quality, it’s just how it goes. Some things stay in the light, other disappear in the shadow, maybe for a little while to appear again. It’s a play, a play of shadow and light.
Making color-studies makes me happy, I’ve made so many in the past while doing my study and research to become a color consultant. I have been attracted to colors as long as I know, and it soon became a passion. I always used to paint in a colorful way but I also love to change my interior from time to time, which could be once a month, ow yes. So when I started to think about color consultancy I focused on home color consulting. My creative part was using colors intuitively but that didn’t seem enough to me, I just wanted to know everything about color and how to use it in a way to create balanced interiors. Color is a phenomenon so I dived into the complex effects of color.
I learned about color psychology, color science, color physics and color theory. I did a lot of research and additional courses. In the end I came to the conclusion that what counts for me is the understanding of color. Perception is a dominant sense, and I was intrigued how colors interact with each other and how the individual colors affect us. So when having studied all these technical facts about color in general, I followed my own path, I started my color consultancy Koloristik combining my knowledge and personal experience to create successful solutions for clients.
So back to color studies, there are only 3 primary colors and we can mix numerous other colors, so when you are passionate there is a lot to discover. There is written so much about color already, it’s not my goal to do that, but what I dó love, is to make you aware of the effect of colors when using them in different combinations and hues and think about it a little bit more when using color, because it has such a great impact on our body and mind.
For the color study in blues and Naples Yellow I was inspired by Lilla Rogers from Make Art That Sells It was one of five mini assignments which was to help you get ready for the 2015 Global Talent Search. I just choose to do this one as it has my point of interest. And it was such fun to do!
I have a passion for colors and patterns. Playing with watercolor and lots of water, seeing the paint flow, going it’s own way blending, feels like magic. I can sit at my desk for hours doing this. The result is piles of paper with circles, dots and splashes which gives me an enormous mount of inspiration. I sometimes make cut-outs, or use them as backgrounds for new paintings. My ‘professional watercolor’ tubes from Winsor & Newton are my favorites, they have such vibrant colors. Especially ‘opera rose’ is one of my favorites, together with phthalo blue, they make some beautiful purple.
I am not that kind of person who writes a lot. I have lots of thoughts, feelings and ideas that I would love to write about. But I always feel as if there are not enough words to express my feelings and thoughts and then I am feeling blocked. When talking, I always use to many words, because I would like people to understand the things I want to say in the same level of detail I see it in my mind. As this is almost impossible, I feel helpless and awkward when it comes to words.
Still, I spend a lot of time musing and wandering about all the projects and inspiration in my head which need to come out in some way. I can not sit at my desk for hours and hours. I will paint for a little while, let it rest, and will get back to it later with a fresh look to finish it. Most of the time this happens through doodling on several pages at the same time. While painting I am surrounded with paper with watercolor splashes and doodles. When there is a more specific theme in my head I look through my stack of paper and start to work out one of them. That’s how it works for me.
Here is one of them, painted circles with leftover paint of my big watercolor brush before changing colors. I reuse this because it feels like waste to spill the paint. For the text shining through I used an app to create this double image.
