Colored artworks

The work of color is central in any artistic work. It is even one of the first tools of the artist. It is difficult to imagine a work that would exist without the working of color - even if it is the absence of color that the artist chooses to present.

Through the ages and artistic movements, the use and meaning attributed to color evolves, but the essence of color remains the same. Every artist must master the properties of color in order to control his composition. In the restoration of paintings, color even becomes a science, because it is necessary to know the different molecules to find the colors and mixtures originally used by the artist.

In the history of art, the importance of color fluctuates according to periods and geographical areas. During the Italian Renaissance, for example, there was a debate (called Paragone) between the authority of color versus drawing: according to the schools, it is the color, and not the line, that creates the emotion and visual power of a work of art. The colors thus take on an immense importance, and assume certain meanings: white symbolizes purity for example, and blue (systematically used to clothe the Virgin Mary) is associated with divinity. These symbols are not thought of randomly: the purple for example, is used since the Byzantine era to signify the highest rank of royalty. Unlike ochre, the purple pigment came from a specific shell, and was extremely difficult - and therefore rare, and expensive - to obtain.

More generally, colors can be divided into three categories: warm, cool, and neutral. As their name implies, these classes of colors give off an atmosphere that the painter can use to influence the emotion of his work. Baroque art, for example, manipulates the contrasts between warm and cold colors to capture the power of bodies. The play of light is exalted by the effects of color. For a long time, the traditional Western school of painting required painters to reproduce the colors of the environment around them. It was the Impressionists, in the 19th century, who explored other ways of seeing - and therefore of transcribing on canvas - their chromatic environment. By avoiding complex mixtures and painting spontaneously, in the open air, the Impressionists reinvented the use of color to reproduce reality.

It was not until abstract and subjective painting that art devoted itself to color as a subject. Mark Rothko, precursor of the Colorfield Painting movement and of abstract expressionism, sees in his paintings a living organism whose color is human and whose format is transcendent. Piet Mondrian, on the other hand, sought in his paintings to approach the very essence of nature through the purity of primary colors, to achieve abstraction. The founder of the Russian avant-garde movement of Suprematism, Kasimir Malevich, will disturb the senses of everyone with his work "White square on white background", in which the color is painted only for itself. Contemporary art, photography, collage, or pop art also use in their respective ways the resources of color, exploring indefinitely all its pluralities. As Picasso said, "When I have no blue, I use red."

Artsper writes art in color: discover below a great selection of works that honor color and its properties. What better way to brighten up an interior?

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Variations picturales harmoniques entre stases et flux constitutifs du moment esthétique au moyen de petits bonds perceptifs dissensuels mais non moins structurants dans une perspective post-contemporaine bigrement insolite.

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Colored artworks

Tête de taureau

Auteil Grandiose Grand Steplee chase paris GR1

Crown du Berlais, Ecurie H&P Pilarski - Course Obstacle - Steeple chase

La sirène

My soft cover

Elephant

Sisyphus Skull

Counting The Beats

Companion Cats Zen animalism oil painting

Bolero - animalism is an oil painting

Beautiful Life

Rise and Shine

Not Alone

Altaïca

Les Cartes -Glups!

Hors

Simorghe #2

Happy Valentine's

Simorghe

Kraken poulpe pieuvre monde universe monstre red earth ecologie

Le nid du courlis - Monotype et collage, figuratif

Horses - ON THE BEACH

Period of Hibernation

Seagulls

Sphere IV

Sphere V

Tigre

Super fat cow

Cows in the fog

Chatnonyme 2340

Chatnonyme

Déli cat

Les 4 cavaliers de l’apocalypse

Fearless

Smell like teen spirit

Bat Beach Party

Il Dolore Dell’Amore

Tigre

Rhinocéros gris

Sans titre

Quack attack

Spiritual Realm 2

Threefold scene

Corinthian order

Magic Cloud - mini

La rencontre

Figures in the dark

Love is the answer

Butterfly

The desire for gold

Insecte

Cochonnet

Chien

Delaunay's dog

Galop

Elephant

Le désert fleuri

Jungle fever

Babies On Board

From the series "Hidden Places" - 08

From the series "Hidden Places" - 07

Photo ID VI

Chat l’Bête 2.3 #121

Welcome Home

Pop Dog

Lion