Color Theory Magazine

coloRTHEYr



acplsigoudhhlbodottitrrtoiavmghceritaaxivrptmuehroyensies

“ patrhboasbtnarabnclytaiotumnroeirseitsrreeealafll ”

joseph albers



joseph albers


german-born american artist and educator who has
worked in various countries such as europe and the
united states, who formed the basis of modern art
education programs of the twentieth century.

student of famous swiss expressionist painter and
designer, johannes itten.

studied in a progressive art school in germany,
bauhaus, where he and his educator, itten, would

follow in with a more “in-depth” study of color.

this study would then curate the theory we use
today of fundamental colors.

color relativity

the human eye contains rods and cones, which
process different wavelengths of light in different
ways. humans perceive an object’s color by the
wavelengths of light that it reflects.
in the absence of light, we cannot discern any
color. the properties of light in any situation have
great influence over the way objects appear.

referring to a color

relative color, is how the color is as its seen in
according too the perception of the eye. absolute
color, is how the color is picked in the area of the
area. local color, is the actual color of an object.

color theory

color is always in a constant change. the
“color theory” was built around the speculation of
“pure” colors. albers believed that color were always

seen in relation to the other various colors
surrounding the original.

it is almost impossible to see a color by itself,
without any sort of interaction.

additive colors

a method to create color by mixing a number of
different light colors, with shades of red, green
and blue. these colors known to be the common
primary colors used in an additive system.

subtractive colors

a method used to create a mixing of set “colors”
to create a wider shade range. each result of
partially or completely subtracting the wavelengths
of light. color that a surface displays depends on
which parts of the visible spectrum are not
absorbed ad therefore remains visible.

light mixtures

the human eye is capable in seeing any color by
adding different percentages of the three additive
primary colors.



color harmonies in photography

most commonly known as analogous,
monochromatic, complementary, spllit complementary,
triadic and quadratic.

analogous

the group of colors that lie directly adjacent to each
other on the color wheel. this group of colors can
have a limited spread of just two colors. or it can
spread further along as much as half of the entire

color wheel, but as it continues to designate further,
it will start to lose its identity as analogous harmony.

monochromatic

comprised of one color, with varying values, meaning
varying degrees of brightness, or varying degrees of
saturation. monochromatic is typically what black and

white images seem to be.

complementary

comprised of two colors that lie directly across from
each other on the color wheel. the spread of
color on either side can be increased to a degree to
include more color on either end.

split complementary

by taking two colors that lie directly adjacent to one
of the colors in a complementary color harmony, you
get a split complementary harmony. a more
difficult harmony to utilize.





triadic

combines any three colors equally spaced from each
other on the color wheel. this harmony is very

similar to a split complementary and in the context of
a landscape photograph, where a “single” color in

an image can often span over a slight range of that
color, sometimes the color harmony identity in the
image can be blurry.

quadratic

combining two colors that are separated by two
hues of color along the color wheel constitues a

diadic color harmony. this harmony has some
flexibility since it is difficult to quantify what exactly

makes up a single hue of color.



references

“additive and subtractive” study accredited business,
study.com/academy/lesson/additive-color

“color contrast” albers-explanation,
cs.brown.edu/courses/albers-explanation

“color relativity” color beyond the wheel, purple own
studios, purpleownstudios.com/blog/color-relativi-
ty-color-theory.html

“josef albers” wikipedia, wikimedia foundation,
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/josef_albers

ross, peter w. “the relativity of color.” synthese, vol.
123, no. 1, 2000, pp. 105–129. JSTOR, JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/20118268.

landscape imagery, color theory. tedgorecreative.com/
blog/2016/2/8/imc0w2lc0ie6b1jtixfht4jgqyjvnu

amanda phakonekham
dsgd 083 sec 02

color theory magazine