How does Colour affect our lives? Conclusion.

Colour has affected our lives since the Egyptians used colour to alter their feelings. We have always been intrigued by the sensations that colours can provide and the qualities that one individual colour holds.

Why do people have a favourite colour? They do because they are drawn to the qualities within that colour. They may be in need of some uplifting and as the research from Reading University shows, it can have an affect on someone. Most of us are still blissfully unaware of the effects that light and colour can have over our lives and just accept it as ‘one of those things’.

Newton was intrigued by the capabilities of colour and thanks to the plague three hundred years ago; we now have a colour system that is recognised as simply common knowledge. Modern printing methods and television have learnt to understand colour and how it affects these methods of communication. Without this understanding where would we be? We would still be wondering why that red on the screen is not the same red when it is printed out.

Also artists use and need colour to allow them to create work that is personal and individual to them. Kandinsky lived for colour and music and so learnt the qualities of each and how to bring the two artistic outlets together. Today we use colour for a number of things and in many ways, but the understanding has evolved to allow us to move more into theories of colour than was made possible before.

I have learnt more about colour over the last few months than I have ever known in my whole life. What started as a curiosity has grown further into a desire to learn how to communicate properly the use of colour. I began with a question of ‘How does colour affect our lives?” and I feel that I answered it for myself with much more than I had reckoned for.

My research is not over…
“stay pretty”

Chapters
01 Introduction
02 Chapter one: theories of colour
03 Chapter two: colour in art
04 Chapter three: subtractive & additive colour systems
05 Chapter four: science in colour
06 Chapter five: colour therapy & alternative therapies
07 Conclusion

Bibliography (in no particular order)

Books

• Colour: Art & Science. Cambridge University Press
• Philosophies of Beauty. E. F. Carritt
• The Penguin Dictionary of Art & Artists
• Interaction of Color. Josef Albers
• The Art Book. Phaidon
• The 20th Century Art Book. Phaidon
• The Art of Color. Johannes Itten
• The Elements of Color. Johannes Itten
• The Dictionary of Graphic Design & Designers. Thames & Hudson
• Graphic Design: A Concise History. Thames & Hudson

Websites

• Marc Rothko (the-artists.org)
• Yves Klein (the-artists.org)
• International Association of Colour (www.iac-colour.co.uk)
• The Basics of Colour Theory (No longer available: www.bracknet.com)
• Colour – Elements and Principles of Design (www.johnlovett.com)
• Colour Therapy Healing (www.colourtherapyhealing.com)
• Colour Therapy – The Alternative Therapy (www.colour-therapy.co.nz)