Black VS White

White Vs Black, no I’m not talking about our racial divide in this country, although maybe I should, but I’m talking about color.  Black is defined as the absence of color while White is defined as the combination of all color.  This is applied to light not to paint and if anyone has tried to combine all color to come up with white, you know what I mean.  All you get is a pretty ugly mud brown.  I was reminded of what is in White and in Black recently when I painted a white horse in oil.  It really was a white horse.  The picture I worked from was taken in strong light so it looked even whiter.  So what colors could there possibly be in an all white horse besides gray?  Well I found out!

White it seems, does have in it every color of the rainbow starting from the purple violet up through the pinks, yellow and blues.  It’s pretty amazing really.  As I looked deeper into the horse, the contrast in the colors began to show themselves. The shadows now began to show purple and blue while spots in the direct sun picked up the sun’s color of yellow and orange.  With the use of color you can imagine what kind of day it is, maybe a warm spring day by the kind of colors that appeared.  Blue and purple could indicate late fall or winter while more warmer colors like yellow and orange could be spring or summer.  I love how the cooler colors trick your eye into seeing depth while the warmer colors pull your eye forward.

It’s a real joy that I have found moving back and forth from my two styles of painting.  One is the Sumi Ink with a splash of color and now the oil with tons of color.  One uses all black and grays and lets the water do the work, while the other explodes with color and I do the work.  I’ll explain that in another blog, bit each style has pushed me to be better in both media’s.  It’s a gift to be able to use and sell both styles and media’s.