background preloader

271 Years Before Pantone, an Artist Mixed and Described Every Color Imaginable in an 800-Page Book

271 Years Before Pantone, an Artist Mixed and Described Every Color Imaginable in an 800-Page Book
In 1692 an artist known only as “A. Boogert” sat down to write a book in Dutch about mixing watercolors. Not only would he begin the book with a bit about the use of color in painting, but would go on to explain how to create certain hues and change the tone by adding one, two, or three parts of water. The premise sounds simple enough, but the final product is almost unfathomable in its detail and scope. Spanning nearly 800 completely handwritten (and painted) pages, Traité des couleurs servant à la peinture à l’eau, was probably the most comprehensive guide to paint and color of its time. According to Medieval book historian Erik Kwakkel who translated part of the introduction, the color book was intended as an educational guide. It’s hard not to compare the hundreds of pages of color to its contemporary equivalent, the Pantone Color Guide, which wouldn’t be published for the first time until 1963. Related:  Colore

'Humanae' Portraits Match People of Different Ethnicities With Their Pantone Color Brazilian fine art photographer Angelica Dass‘ series Humanae identifies portrait subjects from around the world using the Pantone color system. Using an 11×11 pixel swatch from her subjects’ faces, Dass matches them to corresponding Pantone colors, creating an abundant and unique catalog of skin tones that reflects the world’s diversity beyond the categorizations we have long been confined to. We recently asked her more about the ongoing project. What was your inspiration for using Pantone colors to represent humans? “If what I wanted was to destroy the concepts of colors associated with race, such as red, yellow, white and black, it would not be logical to use a color scale that works with percentages of these colors. That’s why I chose not to use CMYK or RGB. How do you go about finding subjects for your work and what are the criteria you are looking for? Since the Pantone system is a highly structured and ordered system, how does your display of the work relate to this system?

The Paradox of Art as Work Photo There are few modern relationships as fraught as the one between art and money. Are they mortal enemies, secret lovers or perfect soul mates? Is the bond between them a source of pride or shame, a marriage of convenience or something tawdrier? The way we habitually think and talk about these matters betrays a deep and venerable ambivalence. On one hand, art is imagined to exist in a realm of value that lies beyond and beneath mere economic considerations. On the other hand, money is now an important measure — maybe the supreme measure — of artistic accomplishment. Everyone might be sure that sales are not the only criterion of success, but no one is quite certain what the others might be, or how, in our data-obsessed era, they might be measured. In the popular imagination, artists tend to exist either at the pinnacle of fame and luxury or in the depths of penury and obscurity — rarely in the middle, where most of the rest of us toil and dream. But it is, nonetheless, a job.

9 of the Best Websites to Teach You Art Skills by Johnny Webber 1. pencilkings.com — Video courses to teach you drawing, painting, and digital art. 2. ctrlpaint.com — A free learning resource dedicated to the basics of digital painting. 3. exposureguide.com — Photography news, tips, and tutorials. 4. cambridgeincolour.com — A learning community for photographers. 5. khanacademy.org — Learn art history basics from cave paintings to contemporary art and everything in between. 6. googleartproject.com — Collections of famous artworks. 7. photography.bastardsbook.com — An open source guide to working with light. 8. artgraphica.net — Learn to sketch, draw, and paint with free lessons. 9. enliighten.com — Learn digital painting using Photoshop. 10. drawspace.com — Online drawing lessons and tutorials. Check out favoriteandforget.com for more of my favorite websites.

Postcards for Ants: A 365-Day Miniature Painting Project by Lorraine Loots Postcards for Ants is an ongoing painting project by Cape Town artist Lorraine Loots who has been creating a miniature painting every single day since January 1, 2013. The artist works with paint brushes, pencils, and bare eyes to render superbly detailed paintings scarcely larger than a small coin. After the first year, Loots relaunched the project in a second phase inspired by Cape Town’s designation as World Design Capital 2014. On her website you can “reserve” a future painting (it’s all booked up for this year), and she’s also printed five limited edition postcards for each day. You can watch her work and hear a bit more about her inspiration in the video below by Gareth Pon, and she also regularly updates on Facebook. Hopefully we’ll see a 2015 project?

Poppies Framed Art Print by Anita Ivancenko by Anita Ivancenko The Vector frame is made from solid wood with a contemporary, angular profile measuring 0.87" wide x 0.87" deep. A gesso coating gives the moulding rich color and a smooth finish. Premium shatterproof acrylic protects the art print, while an acid free dust cover on the back provides a custom finish. Includes wall hanging hardware. Paper size 8" x 10". IllustrationNatureLandscapeMixed Media Colorblind People Experiencing Colors Dans le cadre de la campagne « Color for all » de Valspar, cette marque de peinture et le fabriquant de lunettes EnChroma se sont associés pour créer un documentaire extrêmement émouvant. Grâce à une paire de lunettes spécialement conçue par EnChroma, ils ont permis à des daltoniens de voir en couleurs pour la première fois de leur vie.

10 Shocking Photos That Will Change How You See Consumption And Waste As individual and anonymous consumers, it's seemingly impossible to even estimate the physical ramifications of our daily consumption and waste. While our personal imprints may not seem in themselves worthy of alarm, the combined effect of human's habits and rituals is hard to look away from. Cell phones #2, Atlanta 2005 Photographer Chris Jordan works with the debris we as a society leave behind, photographing massive dumps of cell phones, crushed cars and circuit boards. Squished together in dizzying quantities, the discarded goods resemble hypnotic puzzles, abstracted color fields and hallucinatory fractals. Jordan compares the complex layers of wreckage to the overwhelming detail of the Grand Canyon. The series, dubbed "Intolerable Beauty: Portraits of American Mass Consumption," shows the unmistakable imprint of our American culture in all its horror and strange, dark appeal. Crushed Cars, Tacoma 2004 Steel Shred, Tacoma 2004

New Ethereal Watercolor and Black Ink Cats That Fade into the Canvas by Endre Penovác We continue to be awed by Serbian artist Endre Penovác's ability to somehow control the unforgiving nature of water on paper to produce ghostly paintings of felines. As the mixture of water and black ink bleeds in every direction it appears to perfectly mimic the cat’s fur. In his newest pieces Penovác introduces elements of color and negative space to add a slightly new dimension.

Each Week, Two Anonymous Students Named Dangerdust Create This Amazing Chalkboard Art At the Columbus College of Art and Design, two rogue college students are creating quite a stir… but not by any normal means. They aren’t cheating or stealing, they are causing a creative riot. The anonymous duo, who go by the name Dangerdust, sneak into a classroom each week and create a masterpiece out of nothing but chalk. The pair are both seniors in Advertising & Graphic Design, and they are probably busy with a larger than life course-load, but they still remain passionate about their weekly chalk art. These two create some of the most beautiful (and inspiring) art you’ll ever see. On Sunday or Monday nights, the magic happens. The pair selects a vacant classroom. Then, they get to work. They complete each masterpiece in one fell swoop. It can take up to 11 HOURS to finish one of their designs. “They choose a quote from a list compiled from Google searches and suggestions from friends, draw up a rough sketch, and then get to work using regular chalk.” Even Dr. We need more of THIS!

COLLAGE LOVE: Seascape Framed Art Print by Elephant Trunk Studio by Elephant Trunk Studio The Scoop frame is made from solid wood with a contemporary, scooped profile measuring 1.06" wide x 1.06" deep. A gesso coating gives the moulding rich color and a smooth finish. Premium shatterproof acrylic protects the art print, while an acid free dust cover on the back provides a custom finish. Paper size 20" x 20". CollageMixed MediaLandscapeNature

Shape of eye's 'light pipes' is key to colour sorting Physicists have pinned down precisely how pipe-shaped cells in our retina filter the incoming colours. These cells, which sit in front of the ones that actually sense light, play a major role in our colour vision that was only recently confirmed. They funnel crucial red and green light into cone cells, leaving blue to spill over and be sensed by rod cells - which are responsible for our night vision. Key to this process, researchers now say, is the exact shape of the pipes. The long, thin cells are known as "Muller glia" and they were originally thought to play more of a supporting role in the retina. They clear debris, store energy and generally keep the conditions right for other cells - like the rods and cones behind them - to turn light into electrical signals for the brain. But a study published last year confirmed the idea, proposed in earlier simulations, that Muller cells also function rather like optical fibres. 'Centuries-old puzzle' "This kind of clinched it," he said. Light guides

The Endless Possibilities of Paper Paper is one of the world’s definitive materials. Books, letters, paintings, magazines – everything really good starts with paper. Yet in an increasingly digitised world, where email is king and video rules the Turner Prize, is it a material that is becoming obsolete? Paper Play, a wonderful new book published by Sandu, is arguing eloquently and beautifully against this notion, showcasing an array of artists who manipulate paper in fantastically varied ways. Here we present a selection of beautiful works from Paper Play, alongside an interview with the paper artist Alice von Maltzahn, whose gorgeously intricate pieces feature in the book. What started you working with paper? How does the creative process come about for you? Your work is extraordinary because the pieces are at once creations and destructions, a piece of paper being carved up to become something else - is there a sense of destruction that informs their creation? How is it working with such delicacy and precision?

Caffeinated owl chart

Related: