Workshops

Sara Linda Poly

COLOR CHARTS   (Green and gray exercises to increase color range)

Do these exercises on a piece of gessoed board, paper or canvas, approx 11x14 or larger.  It is helpful to keep these completed projects with you while you are painting for a quick reference of colors.  This exercise can be done with any colors and the more mixing you do the better.  The more information you have in your “mental library” the more successful you will be at painting. 

GREENS:  Using only blues and yellows from your palette, mix each blue with a series of different yellows, including ochre, to make the darkest greens, then progressively add either more yellow or white, (and eventually a little red or orange for the olive tones).  In rows, make small swatches (about an inch square), beginning with darker greens and work your way into lighter, then cooler to warmer,  bright to dull, until you have made at least one hundred different greens. 

GRAYS:  Using each complimentary color pair (orange/blue, yellow/violet, green/red) or any combination of warms and cools, mix the richest darks.  Continue by using varied amounts of warm and cool and adding white to mix as many different greys as you can.  They should look blue grey, green grey, yellow grey, violet grey, etc.  As above do rows until you have a least one hundred.

Some people like to label them with the “recipe” of how they were mixed.  Do this if you like, but if you don’t have that information and you  have to figure it out each time, that is good also!

You can do this exercise with any color combination.