Color Wheel Wednesday

Currently Playing: The Real Reason Your Palette Has Two of Every Color

Split primary color wheels... Double primary palettes... Warm and cool primaries... If you've ever been taught that the "secret" or "key" to mixing paint is that every primary color needs a "warm" and "cool" version, this episode will enlighten you. I've done the research and traced, as best as I can, where that idea actually came from. Turns out red was always, from the beginning of red-yellow-blue mixing theory, a "split" primary. But it took a surprisingly long time for the doubling to be extended to yellow and blue. And it wasn't until the California Watercolor Movement of the 1930s that it took off as a standard palette for teaching and painting. This is Part 1 of 2 — next week we dig into which parts of this theory are useful, which parts are just baggage. So stay tuned! This is also episode 20 of "Color Wheel Wednesday," so feel free to check out the whole playlist if this is your jam. #colortheory #watercolor #arthistory --- BIBLIOGRAPHY François d'Aguilon (Franciscus Aguilonius). Opticorum Libri Sex. Antwerp: Ex officina Plantiniana, apud viduam & filios Io. Moreti, 1613. Thomas Nicols (also spelled Nichols). A Lapidary: Or, The History of Pretious Stones. Cambridge, 1652. Thomas Tryon. The Way to Health, Long Life and Happiness. 1683. (I was looking at the revised edition 1691.) This fascinating and weird book by a fascinating and weird guy discussed color theory only to make an elaborate analogy to proper cooking! [C.B., attributed to Claude Boutet]. Traité de la peinture en mignature, pour apprendre aisément à peindre sans maître. The Hague: Louis & Henry van Dole, 1708 edition. (First published 1672; the colored color-wheel plates first appear in this 1708 edition.) George Field. Chromatography; or, A Treatise on Colours and Pigments, and of their Powers in Painting. London: C. Tilt, 1835. (My physical copy is indeed an original 1835 edition, gifted to me by a generous viewer!) Charles Hayter. An Introduction to Perspective, Adapted to the Capacities of Youth, in a Series of Pleasing and Familiar Dialogues between the Author's Children, etc. London: printed for the author, 60, Wells-Street, Oxford-Street, and sold by Black, Parry, and Co., 1813. Daniel Burleigh Parkhurst. The Painter in Oil: A Complete Treatise on the Principles and Technique Necessary to the Painting of Pictures in Oil Colors. Boston: Lee and Shepard (Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co.), 1898. Rex Brandt. Watercolor with Rex Brandt. Corona del Mar, CA: self-published, 1948. ---. Watercolor Technique in 15 Lessons (6th rev. ed.). New York: Reinhold Publishing Corporation, 1963. ---. The Winning Ways of Watercolor: Basic Techniques and Methods of Transparent Watercolor in Twenty Lessons. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold Co., 1973. Lucia A. Salemme. Color Exercises for the Painter. New York: Watson-Guptill Publications, 1970. Joe Garcia. The Watercolor Bible: A Painter's Complete Guide. Cincinnati, OH: North Light Books, 2006. M. Grumbacher, Inc. Color Compass: An Illustrated Guide for Color Mixing Selection, Color Theory and Harmony. New York: M. Grumbacher, 1972 (1st ed.; reissued 1973, 1977).