What Does 'Hue' Mean in Art?
When we refer to a colour by its name, we are referring to its hue. When you're talking about the the most familiar colours of the colour wheel, such as Red, Yellow, Green, and Blue, you are referring to hues.
However, once we are familiar and understand the colour families, we can use this term 'hue' in much more finer detail. For example, if you think of a hue as the underlying colour or its source of origin – let's use Blue as an example – within this family we can give the more specific hues different names, such as Cobalt Blue, Prussian Blue, Ultramarine Blue, Phthalocyanine Blue, Turquoise Blue, and so on. From the Red colour family, familiar hue names can be; Alizarin Crimson, Magenta, Cadmium Red, Vermillion, Rose Madder, and more. Likewise, in the Yellow family, familiar hue names would be Lemon Yellow, Cadmium Yellow, Gamboge, Yellow Ochre, Naples Yellow, Raw Sienna, and so forth.
As you read further, we look at probably our first experience of colour in the visible colour spectrum, before further explaining common Art and Design terminology. This will help you develop a knowledge of colour theory that will underpin and inform your visual literacy and aid you in the creative process!
Let's Begin with Rainbows!
One of the most common introductions to colour as a young child is the colours of the rainbow. Many of us probably already know the song "I Can Sing the Rainbow". If you don't recognise it by name, you may recognise the tune or lyrics, which go; "Red and Yellow and Pink and Green, Orange and Purple and Blue"! Incidentally, this is not the order in which we actually perceive a rainbow. Rather, the colour spectrum – at its most basic – goes "Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet", as seen in the image above.
We all marvel at the beautiful spectacle of a rainbow for as long as we can when they do arrive, knowing how transient they are! Like a huge painting, they hang over us – the more vivid and intense the more thrilling! As children, it's hard to understand that the colours we perceive are varying wavelengths created by light and not physical colour! Red being the longest wavelength and violet being the shortest, then all the other colours in between! In fact we think we see seven distinct colours, but in reality the edges of every hue is blurred somewhat, so we might see yellow green or green blue.
Dominant Wavelength
The colours we see when light strikes an object are the result of certain wavelengths being absorbed by the object while other wavelengths are being reflected back at us. Those colours reflected back are focused by the lenses of our eyes and projected onto the cones of our eyes, which is then processed by the occipital lobe of our brains into the colours we see.
However, colour is subjective, as physiology differs from one person to the next, we each perceive colours slightly differently. Many people even exhibit differing kinds of colour blindness, which occurs when certain cones in the retina are either missing or not working properly.
When we talk about colour, we use a certain vocabulary, such as words like hue, value, shade, tint, tone, complimentary colours, and saturation (also known as chroma or intensity). Many colours have specific associations attached to them, such as red being associated with danger, love, and passion. However, many of these meanings can change from culture to culture.
Choosing colours and pigments to work as a vehicle for communicating your ideas can be incredibly confusing and time consuming as an aspiring artist! However, knowing even just a little bit of colour theory can go along way! This information could save you time in your practise and save you money when buying pigments.
Colour Mixing Guides:
In the following paragraphs, we'll be taking a look at different several colour theory terms and palettes. A good way to visualise these terms when working is to use a colour wheel, and, luckily for you, we have a few colour wheels and guides available on the ARTdiscount website!
For more information on how to use a colour wheel, check out the ARTdiscount Blog article "A Beginner's Guide to Using the Colour Wheel".
To Get You Started, Here's a Brief Overview of the Most Commonly-Used Terms
Understanding colour vocabulary will help you to describe, discuss, and categorise colour within your artwork. The following isn't an exhaustive list of terms artists use within this area of study, but abut will serve as a solid foundation for understanding some of the complicated aspects of colour theory.
Hue:
The word 'Hue' refers to a particular colour family – like the aforementioned colours of the rainbow – describing the dominant wavelength of a colour.
Also refers to any pure colour when used to describe different palettes, for example; "a palette of pure hues will create a strong contrast when used with a palette of neutrals". It can also be used as a term to describe the creation of tints, shades or tones, for example; "a pure hue is used plus white to create a tint"
When buying paints, the word 'hue' can indicate the pigment is not pure, but that the paint is instead a mix of alternative synthetic pigments to create a similar historical colour. This is often done because the historical colour may no longer be manufactured due to toxicity levels, or that has been created as a cheaper alternative to a very expensive natural mineral ingredient pigment. An example of this is the popular and historic colour Ultramarine, which was created by crushing Lapis Lazuli, a semi-precious stone. French Ultramarine pigment was developed as a cheaper alternative and, as a result, has grown into an equally popular option among artists today.
See below (or click here!) for more information on pigments.
Saturation (Also Known As Chroma, Brightness, or Intensity):
Saturation refers to the richness or purity of a colour. Highly-saturated colours are incredibly rich and have a pure pigment load, whilst colours that are low in saturation may appear duller or muted.
Value:
Value refers to the lightness or darkness of a particular colour. For example, a darker colour will be called low in value, while a brighter colour will be higher in value.
Tints:
A tint is created when a white pigment is added to create a paler or lighter version of the original hue. Depending on the degrees of white pigment added to the mix, you can create a pallete of pastel colours. Any colour can become a tint when white is added.
Tones:
A tone is created when grey is added to the original hue to create a darker, more muted, less intense alternative. Varying proportions of grey can be added to the mix to create different tones light or dark. In this context, grey is made from mixing just white pigment and black.
Shade:
A shade is any colour that has been darkened with black. Colours can darken very quickly, so by adding small amounts of black incrementally will help you to control the shade.
Primary Colours:
The primary colours are hues that cannot be created by mixing any other colours together. They're commonly known as Red, Blue, and Yellow.
Secondary Colours:
Secondary colours are made when two primary colours mixed together, creating Green, Orange, and Purple.
Tertiary Colours:
A tertiary colour is made up of a primary and a secondary colour, for example; red-orange, blue-green, or red-violet.
Neutrals:
White, Black and Grey are classed as neutrals and are the opposite of a pure hue. (some artists refer to Brown as a neutral)
Colour Schemes You Can Create Using the Colour Wheel
Pictured Above: The Old Tower in the Fields, Vincent van Gogh, Oil on Canvas, 1884
Monochromatic:
A monochromatic colour scheme is the most simple of all. It features only one colour in a variety of values. Note how in the above painting, van Gogh uses only orange hues with only the values to differentiate each object in the scene.
Pictured Above: The Pink Cloud, Henri-Edmond Cross, Oil on Canvas, c. 1896
Complimentary Colours:
Complimentary colours sit opposite each other on the colour wheel. For example Red and Green, or Blue and Orange. When painted adjacent to one another, they create strong contrasts. See how Cross uses greens and reds to create a sharp juxtaposition between the gardens, seas, and land.
Pictured Above: The Japanese Footbridge and the Water Lily Pool, Claude Monet, Oil on Canvas, 1899
Analogous:
Three colours that sit side by side on a colour wheel, for example Red, Orange and Yellow, or Blue, Indigo, Violet. In his famous Water Lillies series, which spanned over 30 years of his life, Claude Monet often used the analogous colour scheme of Greens, Yellow-Greens, and Blue-Greens to build beautiful, harmonious paintings.
Pictured Above: Les Alyscamps, Vincent van Gogh, Oil on Canvas, 1888
Triadic:
A triadic colours scheme is built out of three colours that are equally spaced around the colour wheel, such as the blues, oranges, and flecks of red seen in van Gogh's Les Alyscamps.
Achromatic:
This term refers to having no colour, just black, grey or white. It's also sometimes called Neutrals. An achromatic scale would be a range of greys to create a range of values; starting from white through to black. Artists create achromatic value scales and use them to check the value of a colour within their artwork to determine whether they are creating enough contrast.
What Hue Means When Purchasing Pigments
Natural Pigments & Hues:
In the Technical Art Questions Top 40, this query must have spent more time at No. 1 than any other. And it's a fair question, since one will see you buying a relatively inexpensive paint, and the other could see you spending two or three times as much.
So why is this? If you roll back the clock to when pigment production was in its infancy, one of the qualities sought after by those early manufacturers was permanence. Now, 'infancy' could mean as far back as when our ancestors, grief-stricken by the death of a relative or pretty chuffed at the successfully bludgeoning of an ill-tempered elk, first tried to immortalise that event on a cave wall, using those colours available to them. It's hard to believe that the earliest of artists didn't try a bit of everything, employing bog-standard trial-and-error to ascertain which of those 'found pigments' didn't flake off, didn't wash away, and didn't fade too quickly. We know from archaeological evidence that ochres, sienna and umbers - naturally-occurring iron compounds - stand the test of time; they still exist today, thousands of years later, paying testament to the ingenuity of the artists who painted with them.
Toxicity
Thanks to artistic pioneers – whether they be from the Palaeolithic or the Renaissance – we now have at our disposal knowledge of thousands of pigments, most of them selected for vibrancy and permanence. The flipside of this is that, owing to the limitations of the time, safety hasn't been much of a consideration, and substances which are now well-known for their toxicity were commonly used in pigments. Heavy metals such as cadmium, cobalt and lead all found their way into the mix, with lead eventually being replaced with the far safer titanium dioxide.
Mixing Colour
Substitute Pigments
The search for safer and, in some cases, cheaper pigments has lead to an increase in the synthesis of alternative compounds. These are what are used in paints labelled as 'hues'. Cadmium Red Hue does not contain any cadmium, but rather a compound of pigments that imitates the hue of cadmium. The 'hue' indicates that the paint does not comprise the genuine pigments found in the non-hue product. An alternative, nearest colour, pigment, is used, or a blend of pigments, in order to create the colour.
Artist-quality paints are more likely to contain genuine pigments rather than hues. They're generally preferred by professional artists as their constitute pigments are less likely to fade over time. Hues may not replicate the vibrancy of their genuine counterparts, and they may be prone to fading in sunlight.
Another issue which some artists experience is that the blended substitute pigments may separate during drying, resulting in a slight colour shift. Fading and colour shifts are not critical for everyone; the less expensive alternatives are often labelled as Student-Quality in recognition of their popularity with those in education, for whom budget is a great consideration.
As always, it comes down to preference. Jobbing illustrators who digitally scan their work soon after completion may not be too concerned with a pigment fading over time. Even professional artists and illustrators have budgetary constraints. It's entirely possible that future hues will be closer than ever to their genuine counterparts, and it's also possible that some genuine pigments may be banned, as nearly happened to cadmium quite recently.
It's All Up to Hue!
We hope this article has helped you get a grasp on some of the basics of colour theory, and that you're now thinking of the incredible potential that all the hues of the world have. Be sure to share your work with us via the hashtag #ColouringTheNation on Instagram, we can't wait to see what you create!
