In Reply to: Colour mixing and long-deep breath! posted by Solomon Meteku on 11/06/01 at 6:04 AM:

: Many thanks for the quick respons. Can you name any of the colour charts books you advised i should use?
: Now to something completely different..Shadows! So long as there is light so shall there be shadows, one can't do without them, I mean in paintings, with their tint, hues, how they complement the lighter side etc etc, God knows what else.
: For the sake of brevity; when you make shadows they tend to be more "prominent" if you lay them thick, which i often do for i am more into impressionism..and then i put yet thicker paint on the light side to let it come out and shine!
: Question is;
: 1: Is it wise to use darker comlements for shadows, applying it very lightly, not thick?
: 2: There are shadows in bright light, in shade and even in darkness..the theory of Helen Van Wijk (may she rest in peace) of using grey for shadow and white for light or highlihgt doesn't hold true as i have tried it.
: 3: Each colour has its shadow complement or a darker coplement that goes with it, in which case the colour wheel comes in handy, am i right?
: 4: When you paint wet on wet do you apply the darker ones on the lghter one?
: 5: When you paint light skin, brown or ones with real darker complexions, in light, in shadow or even in a darker room, which colour tubes do i need to keep at hand? for instance if you use a touch of violet or earth green or ultramarine
: or other blues to shadow a red tinted skin the result is not always that good. Last but not least, I was mesmerized by the beauty and cleanliness of the colours of Lawrence Alma Tadema, the great Dutch born classisist/romantisist who lived, worked and died, as a Knight, SIR ALMA! in England;
How on earth did he achieve such purity, cleanness and glance of clorours, which enchant any eye, eventhough the subjects of his paintings, the themes, won't always appeal to all. The shadows in his paintings! What is the secret behind it all, does anyone know or has a guess?

: So what is the nearest solution, using the mixtrure, say of a dark background for shadows, as i suspect is the case in Alma Tadem's pictures?
: I know there is someone out there, a painter who has been through all this, sufferd through it all and truimphantly won over it, who can reach out with an "edible" advise or tip on this complex issue,
: Keeping my ears and eyes, and of cource my internet, open,
: Greeting.
: Solomon