Saturday, January 17, 2004

color theory in winter

This latest snowfall combined with sub zero temps, has given me new awareness to the world of color around me. This snow is very powdery and frosty. You can see the 6 sides of the snowflakes, and the sunlight (when it shows itself) makes thousands of little prism's over the surface of the snow. In the sunlight the snow is a blinding yellow white, but once the sun went behind a cloud, the snow turned a light blue white color. Although the landscape is basically white, gray and green, it inspires me to want to work with rich, vibrant and warm colors!
So, while I was outside shoveling (whining to myself about how I would rather be indoors and spinning), I started to think about what kind of yarn I would like to make. Naturally, I considered what wool I had cleaned and dyed and was waiting in the wings to be spun. I had the wool from the butternut dye-bath, and the goldenrod and the marigolds, and the hopi sunflower...but the colors were not doing it for me. Why had these colors seemed so pleasing and subtle during the month of October, and now, they seemed drab and washed out. Did the color fade? OR WAS IT ALL ABOUT LIGHT?? All these thoughts about color and light refractions etc. start to dominate my thoughts.
When I went inside I perused my bookshelves looking for my old copy of A.H. Munsell's "A Color Notation", hoping to find my answer. I am aware that I could be asking for trouble, this could lead me down the path of frustration and "over analysis". Attempts in the past to "understand color" have not always been satisfactory. Here are a few tidbits from Munsell that I have been chewing on.
On color balance or visual comfort:
"Color balance soon leads to a study of optics in one direction, to aesthetics in another, and to mathematical proportions in a third, and any attempt at an easy solution of its problems is not likely to succeed."
TRANSLATION: NO EASY ANSWER HERE.
On color Physiology:
"Back of the eye lies that function which discriminates various color sensations and proceeds to act upon them. This color judgment is swayed by several factors and is liable to deception...such as freshness or fatigue of the nervous system which may cause delusions, known as retinal fatigue."
TRANSLATION: DO ANY OF US EVER SEE THE SAME COLOR AT THE SAME TIME?
On Color Arrangement:
"A colorist is keenly alive to feelings of satisfaction or annoyance, and consciously or unconsciously he rejects certain combinations of colors and accepts others. This effort to establish pleasing proportions may be unconscious in one temperament, while it becomes a matter of definite analysis in another."
TRANSLATION: I KNOW WHAT I LIKE, BUT DO I KNOW WHY I LIKE IT?
So color remains a mystery, but it fascinates me. I might even spin up some plain white finn wool and break open a bottle of the RIT DYE!!!

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