Color Choices

Sorry for my laxness in posting. Being lazy by nature, new to the routine and add in my favorite meal of the year and I have a host of excuses to choose from. (As a good friend is fond of saying "God grant me my excuses with out which I am nothing")
On to the subject of color and how I attempt to use it when I paint and abstract or most any subject. At the top of this post is picture of kind of color wheel I use based on the Munsell color notation system, many artists better than I use these ideas and write about them. The main difference from the 3 primary color wheel of grade school fame Red , Yellow, and Blue is the addition of 2 more primary colors, Green and Purple. This results in more accurate color compliments ( ie, colors opposite each other on the wheel). This system is used by science and industry to precisely describe a color and reproduce it.
Robert Burridge adapted this system to the paints made by Holbein but you can use any brand of paint to create your own color wheel. Between each of the five evenly spaced primaries are the five secondaries ie yellow-green or blue-green,etc.. This model lets the artist start with 10 colors of paint(hue) plus white and black and in theory mix any color she ever needs.
In practice a painting has more impact if there is a dominate color/hue for each painting, the red painting the green painting. Once you pick the dominate color its opposite or compliment is the strongest color choice for using as the center of interest. and as Burridge calls them your spice colors, are on either side of the compliment with one color between them. This gives you 4 colors to paint with,plus black and white.
By limiting your palette the odds of creating a stronger painting are improved and your mind is freer to concentrate on the one million other choices needed to build a picture.
Here is a sample of how I used some of these concepts in a painting I plan to use for my Christmas card. Enjoy the sneak preview.


Ornaments '08
12x12
Acrylic on canvas panel

I was thinking red and green to represent the Christmas season and red is the dominant hue, green it the compliment The center of interest is the ornaments In Munsell a blue green is the compliment of a red and my center ornament leans toward that hue.

Thanks for your patience as I learn the blogging world and let me know what you think.