Artists & Illustrators - UK (2021-04)

COLOUR THEORY

I

n the first part of my series on mixing secondary

colours last month, I used the colour orange as a

means to explore the basic concept of an artist’s

palette and how a suitable choice of hues can make

colour mixing so much easier and more predictable.

The twin primary palette uses two reds, two blues and

two yellows, with each pair of primaries biased towards

their two adjacent secondaries.

In that first article, I looked at mixing oranges from our

primary yellows and reds, but pointed out that, because

red, orange and yellow are clearly and closely related to

one another, the mixing possibilities don’t really give much

in the way of impact. This month I will look at mixing

purples and how the possibilities of the twin primary

system really steps things up a notch.

CHOOSING HUES

You will know that purple can be mixed by using red and

blue. However, as I am going to utilise the twin primary

system, I will be using two versions of each primary.

For this article, I’ll be using the same reds as last month:

Winsor Red (the same pigment, PR25, as Pyrrole Red in

some brands), which is biased towards orange, and

Quinacridone Magenta, which is biased towards purple.

For the blues, I have chosen French Ultramarine, which

is biased towards purple, and Phthalo Blue (Green Shade),

which is, as its name suggests, biased towards green.

Watercolourist GRAHAME BOOTH is looking in

turn at the three secondary colours and how to

mix them. In this second instalment, he shows

you how to create a range of purples

Ardglass, watercolour on Saunders

425gsm NOT paper, 51x38cm

I used my intermediate purple mix of Phthalo Blue (Green

Shade) and Quinacridone Magenta here, essentially to

create the variety of blues in the sky, sea and rooftops.

The shadows and rocks were created mainly from the dull

purple mix of Phthalo Blue (Green Shade) and Winsor Red.

COLOURWHEEL

Youcanseehowourtwinprimariesfitintoour

colourwheel.Theprecisecoloursarenotreally

thatimportantaslongastheyhavethecolour

biasindicated.Tomixa brightpurple,mixthe

primariesclosesttopurpleandfora dullpurple,

usetheprimariesfurthestaway.

Blue

biased

towards

red

Bluebiased

towardsyellow

Redbiased

towardsyellow

Redbiased

towardsblue

Dull

Bright

Red

Yellow Blue