Exploring colour, chance and the unfamiliar
I have to admit that blue is not a favourite colour of mine despite being one of the worlds favourite colours I much prefer working with earth colours and neutrals, the muted tones of weathered surfaces, rust, stone and decaying materials. Recently, however, I have been trying to overcome this preference by making a series of paintings in which blue becomes the dominant colour.
Working outside a familiar palette is an interesting exercise. It forces you to reconsider established habits and approach painting with fewer preconceptions. Rather than treating blue simply as a colour, I have been exploring its possibilities as a means of creating atmosphere, depth and structure.
The paintings have developed through a process of layering, adding and removing paint, building textures and allowing earlier marks to remain visible. Scraping, rubbing back and overpainting create surfaces that suggest erosion, weathering and the passage of time. These are qualities I have always been interested in, regardless of the colours being used. In some paintings, blue becomes almost architectural, with overlapping shapes and fragments of asemic writing suggesting traces of forgotten structures or partially erased histories. In others, it takes on a more atmospheric quality, suggesting distant horizons, uncertain landscapes and spaces that exist somewhere between abstraction and representation.
Small interruptions of orange, yellow, green and white provide a contrast to the dominant blues. Sometimes these appear as isolated marks elsewhere, they become important compositional elements. The narrow bands of light in two of the paintings, for example, create a sense of distance and stillness, while the more colourful works introduce a greater degree of movement and complexity. Throughout the process, I have tried to retain an element of chance, allowing unexpected combinations of colour, texture and marks to influence the direction of each painting rather than working towards a predetermined result.
I am not sure that blue will ever replace my affection for earth colours, but that is perhaps beside the point. The value of the exercise lies in working with something unfamiliar, challenging established preferences and discovering possibilities that might otherwise have remained unexplored.
And perhaps, after all, blue is beginning to grow on me.
Why People Prefer Certain Colours: Biological, Psychological, and Cultural Factors