Living with color, from an artist’s point of view

Because by profession and training I am a designer, illustrator and painter of paintings, living with color is what I do best.

PT Barnum is right! My world is also cherry red and turquoise and lime green. It is also taupe, celadon, sand, and terracotta. I can’t even imagine a world without color. It may not be consciously central to everyone’s life, but you can be sure that it affects everyone. It has the power to be irritating or calming. It can raise your blood pressure, lower it, suppress your appetite, energize you, or rock you to sleep. I have also heard that by using bright colors in a baby’s room, you can increase the baby’s IQ.

Color is powerful, particularly in interior design because it encompasses our entire environment. We all live with color every day!

You cannot take the painter from the designer and vice versa. When I design a room, I like to think of the entire room as a painting. Faced with a blank canvas, you think about organization and structure. There is a structure to the use of color. You can use many shades in a room setting, but their shades should play well with each other like intertwined hands. Otherwise they will just fly away and you will have chaos instead of order. One color will affect the next color. The only way to know how any group of colors is related is to put them together and work backwards. Have a look. Did you create harmony or discord? You be the judge.

When structuring the color of your room, think of three big points of color. Odd numbers work better than even numbers, and three is a good number to work with. By color spot I mean the dominant tone. Your carpet may be predominantly brown, so brown is one of your points. Your carpet (floor) has a dominant tone, your walls are another tone, your main piece of furniture is a spot. The three places must relate to each other and be pleasant together. Clever! Now you have structure. Congratulations. Great start!

We all prefer to live with a color that suits our tastes and personalities. If you’re comfortable with earth tones and neutrals, go for it. If you’re a blue person, go for it. If you are an art collector and like to have art on your walls, select a hue that highlights your art. You don’t necessarily have to paint your walls white. Line your art around the room and then decide what color to use on the wall that will make the art the star of the show.

I have much more to say on this subject. In the meantime, you may be interested in reading this: Color It Yourself

Enjoy its soft sand. Enjoy your bold red. Of course, enjoy living with color!

Joan S.

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