Trending colors don’t only show up as wall colors in homes, but they are visible in every art form. Published for the fashion industry by the Pantone Color Institute, the London Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2023 Season Report features ten standout colors as well as current takes on classics. The 10 magnificent colors are: Cherry Tomato, Persimmon, Iced Mango, Blazing Yellow, Titanite, Andean Toucan, Airy Blue, Electric Blue Lemonade, Spring Crocus, and Pink Cosmos.
How to mix Wall Colors with your Artwork: Color of the Year and Color Trends 2023
Understanding the subtleties of colors is art itself. As an artist, you’ll probably crave to master color swatches using your preferred technique: how hues show up in your medium once they dry or once you develop your RAW photographs. Mastering colors is also important when it comes to the marketing and communication of your body of work. Here, you’ll learn how to create provocative marketing materials to make your artwork stand out.
Let’s go through the fundamentals of color theory, talk about all the 2023 Colors of the Year we know so far, and the top most loved colors per country. Additionally, we’ll explore how to use these hues as wall colors in room mockups to make compelling visuals where your artwork will stand out.
Basic Color Theory: The Fundamentals
Color theory is the body of practical guidance for color, let’s say it’s the science but also the art of using color. It describes how human beings perceive color and the effects of how colors blend, match, or contrast with each other. This science also involves the messages a color communicates.
In color theory, colors are organized on a color wheel and grouped into 3 categories: primary colors, secondary colors, and tertiary colors.
Draw a line through the center of the wheel, and you’ll separate the cool colors (blues, greens, purples) from the warm ones (reds, oranges, yellows).
Warm colors are generally associated with energy, brightness, and action, whereas cool ones are often identified with calm, peace, and serenity.
Color Scheme vs. Color Palette
Since the terms “color scheme” and “color palette” refer to the colors that you choose for your project, these are regularly used as synonyms. When it comes to color theory, there are specific color schemes that describe how the colors from the color wheel are selected and brought together, some of these schemes are: monochromatic, complementary color, analog colors, and triadic colors. Whereas the term color palette is more specific, and it can be found in nature, personal taste, and trends.
Monochromatic
Monochromatic color palettes are made up of a single base hue, then extended with that hue’s shades, tints, and tones.
By adding black, white, or gray to a color, you can create a consistent and versatile monochromatic scheme that’s very easy on the eyes. This is a very simple and effective choice when selecting a palette.
Complementary Colors
Complementary colors are opposites on the color wheel. These are red and green, purple and yellow, and orange and blue. The sharp contrast that complementary colors create can really make visuals pop.
Analog Colors
Analogous colors are placed next to one another on the color wheel: purple, blue, and green, for example. It is usually said that when designing an analogous scheme, one color will be predominant, one will act as support and another one will accentuate the selection.
Triadic Colors
Triadic colors are evenly spaced around the color wheel, forming a perfect triangle, and tend to be very vibrant.
Using a triadic color scheme in your artworks or visual materials will create contrast and harmony at the same time.
The Top Most Loved Colors
Have you ever wondered what the most popular color in the world is? It turns out many surveys have been conducted along the years, and the discouraging conclusion is that humanity’s favorite hue isn’t constant. The answer varies with the year, survey method, and population sampled. Appreciating hues is highly influenced by culture.
According to Shutterstock, in 2022, some popular colors by country are: Argentina #20B2AA, Australia #FAF0E6, Brazil #FFC0CB, Canada #FFE4E1, France #FAF0E6, India #FFC0CB, Italy #FFB6C1, Japan #F5DEB3, South Africa #FFA500, Spain #F4A460, United Kingdom #FFC0CB, United States #FFE4E1.
Whatever the current trend may be, it’s important to understand how to play around with these shades in order to make the best out of them.
Stage 1
Choose three single pigment primary colours (or equivalent). Three I use regularly in the studio are: Winsor Lemon, French Ultramarine and Opera Rose (as an alternative to red or magenta). I love the way that they sit alongside one another and combine to make new colours.
Stage 2
Paint a swatch of each primary colour in a row across your page, leaving space to the side of each. Using single pigment colours can help the qualities of each paint to show more distinctly – take note of things like how transparent or opaque they are. Note: use a different brush for each colour.
Stage 3
Mix a pool of each secondary colour, enough to paint a swatch next to each primary and for further mixing. Use the Winsor Lemon and French Ultramarine to make green; Winsor Lemon and Opera Rose for orange; and French Ultramarine and Opera Rose for purple.
