Complementary Colors - Art and Design

Art and Design

Because of the limitations imposed by the range of colors that were available throughout most of the history of art, many artists still use a traditional set of complementary pairs, including (as proposed by Goethe, cf. Goethe's color wheel):

• red and green
• blue and orange
• yellow and violet

The complement of each primary color (red, blue, or yellow) is roughly the color made by mixing the other two in a subtractive system:

• red complements (blue + yellow) = green
• blue complements (red + yellow) = orange
• yellow complements (red + blue) = violet

When two complements of opaque paint are mixed, they approximate black. For example, a little bit of ultramarine mixed with orange, produces a dark variation of black. Placed side by side as tiny dots, in partitive color mixing, they produce gray. As colored light projected on a white screen, in additive color mixing, they produce white.

The use of complementary colors is an important aspect of aesthetically pleasing art and graphic design. This also extends to other fields such as contrasting colors in logos and retail display. When placed next to each other, complements make each other appear brighter. On an artistic color wheel, complementary colors are placed opposite one another. Although these artistic complements may not be precise complements under the scientific definition, most artistic color wheels are laid out roughly like the HSV color wheel discussed above.