Color Play: Expanded & Updated • Over 100 New Quilts • Transparency, Luminosity, Depth & More
By Joen Wolfrom
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About this ebook
Joen Wolfrom
Joen Wolfrom is a bestselling author who has lectured and taught throughout the world for more than 30 years on the topics of color, design, innovative fabric art, and quiltmaking. joenwolfrom.com
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Book preview
Color Play - Joen Wolfrom
noted
Dedication
This book is dedicated to
JOSEPH, who loves orange fully and without hesitation;
FRANKIE, who thinks pink is the only color in the world;
MICAH, who loves the warm sky blues that match his eyes;
and
JACK, who loves all greens and wears them with panache.
Acknowledgments
Many thanks go to all who have contributed to the making of Color Play, Second Edition. Special thanks goes to my editor, Liz Aneloski, whose many attributes include patience and foresight. I would not have written this book without Liz. Also, I am indebted to the many hands and minds at C&T who have been committed to making this a beautiful book in all ways. Thanks to you all. I love your enthusiasm, your care, and your individual talents.
Also, I am so grateful to be part of a sharing community of talented artists/quilters who have so willingly offered to have their work in this book. Their sharing allows me to use wonderful artwork to illustrate the many concepts discussed in this book. Thank you! I am both indebted to you and in awe of your talents:
B. J. Adams
Ludmila Aristova
Mai-Britt Axelsen
Joanne Baeth
Linda Beach
Pam Berry
Lies Bos-Varkevisser
Elizabeth (Liz) Broussard
Reta Budd
Melinda Bula
Betty Busby
Lenore Crawford
Linda Crouch-McCreadie
Joan Dyer
Chris Eichner
Ronna Erickson
Caryl Bryer Fallert-Gentry
Ann Feitelson
Kay D. Haerland
Kris Hall
Robin M. Haller
Gloria Hansen
Mary Hoover
Lin Hsin-Chen
Larisa Krantz Key
Karen Kielmeyer
Rita Young Kilstrom
Terry Kramzar
Sue Krause
Liz Kuny
Ellin Larimer
Gloria Loughman
Nancy Sterett Martin
Kim McLean
Kathy McNeil
Elaine Meyers
Sue Michalka
Thelma Moyer
Cat Nix
Barbara Persing
Christine Porter
Judith Reilly
Jane Rixon
Ann Sanderson
Lin Schiffner
Norma Schlager
Stacey Sharman
Karen Sistek
Val Smith
Shelley Swanland
Timna Tarr
Judy Mercer Tescher
Kate Themel
Annette Valtl
Molly Waddell
Rachel Wetzler
Kent Williams
Pamela Zave
To you—I thank you for your continued support of my color-related endeavors. It’s been an amazing experience for me. Many thanks for choosing Color Play, Second Edition to guide you in your personal color quest. Enjoy learning, experimenting, and creating. Happy coloring!
GALLERY A
Silk Indian Orange Peel, Stacey Sharman, 63˝ × 63˝, 2008, Berkeley, California
Stacey created her exquisite orange peel quilt from a wide array of tie silks. You can see a wonderful play of light with value changes throughout this quilt. Stacy’s design is filled with the illusion of transparency, as one circle appears to overlap another. Foundation paper–pieced, this quilt uses a pattern from the book Karen K. Stone Quilts by Karen K. Stone.
More Than a Memory, Kathy McNeil, 62˝ × 52˝, 2012, Tulalip, Washington
Although fall is in the air, most of the colors in this beautiful scene are from the tone scale, as they reflect what often surrounds us in nature. Using this scale softens the hues and works well with both a realistic scene and a memory. The interspersed shaded hues are rich and dark. In the background is a hint of the sun’s light flowing through. Its luminous glow is made from slightly toned hues that are more pure than the colors that surround it. Kathy’s beautiful mixture of fabrics for the featured tree’s trunk is wonderful.
Cosmic Feathers #1, Caryl Bryer Fallert, 30˝ × 30˝, 2013, Paducah, Kentucky/Port Townsend, Washington
Caryl, a renowned colorist, sets into motion a swirl of harmonious colors in this design. Our eyes are attracted first to the strongly colored hues that have the least amount of grayness in their coloring. These hues move our eyes in a curving motion throughout the design. The softest, most toned colors recede as the strongest, clearest colors advance toward us. Caryl uses a wide range of analogous colors in Cosmic Feathers #1.
Waiting Out Winter, Linda Beach, 47˝ × 47˝, 2011, Estes Park, Colorado
Linda visually paints a picture in fabric of the quiet tones that evoke wintry memories of snow-drifted landscapes. Amid the winter scene is an eloquent tree that refuses to be part of the muted winter. It’s dressed in colorful hues from trunk to branch tips. Although bright, they are still part of the tone scale—but subtly toned. The contrast between the spirited tree and the wintry elements is superb.
Mass Maples, Timna Tarr, 74˝ × 80˝, 2013, South Hadley, Massachusetts
Timna has presented us with a mass of maple leaves in celebration of Massachusetts’s glorious fall season. The interplay of leaves and background make this an amazing quilt. Many beautiful shades with their rich, dark hues attract our attention in this predominantly tone-scale design. Timna creates subtle luster through her use of value. Color temperature enhances the illusion of depth and creates a sense of movement.
The Bells of Moscow, Ludmila Aristova, 11˝ × 11˝, 2012, Brooklyn, New York
Evocative and symbolic with its blend of colors and shapes, The Bells of Moscow brings us a poignant vision of Moscow with its ancient Russian architecture, including beautiful white marble buildings and churches adorned with blue or gold onion-shaped domes topped with symbolic stars. This scene is created almost exclusively in the tone scale. By using blues with more purity in their coloring than the rest of the scene, Ludmila focuses on the set of five blue domes. Because of this coloring, our eyes move directly to these beautiful domes. Ludmila has made the other architectural features take on lesser roles by using colorings that are more toned than the blues.
Bygone Days, Reta Budd, 23˝ × 18˝, 2002, Beachville, Ontario, Canada
Bygone Days creates a nostalgic mood with its beautiful toned hues. The tree that catches our eyes has the least amount of grayness in its coloring. Thus it comes forward visually. The sky has only a hint of blue in its makeup. The reds in this scene do not catch our attention, as their visual strength has been diluted with versions of red tones and shades. Depth is created primarily through overlapping. Reta’s use of fabric and her attention to detail make this a remarkable work of art.
Leaving, Ann Feitelson, 74˝ × 43˝, 2009, Montague, Massachusetts
This mourning quilt, made by Ann in her mother’s memory, is filled with beauty and emotion. The change of values, moving from light to dark, is evocative. Ann uses a split-complementary color plan with a beautiful range of greens enriching its complementary purples. The purple’s range extends slightly to colors on each side of it: red-violet and fuchsia. The brightest greens and clearest lavenders enhance the beauty of this quilt.
Sunrise, Ludmila Aristova, 14˝ × 14˝, 2006, Brooklyn, New York
With innovative sewing techniques and superb fabric selection, Ludmila created a great New York City landscape. She used overlapping to create the illusion of depth. The buildings are made in a wide value range with a variety of toned fabrics. The hues in the uplifting sky are particularly beautiful with the tan, beige, and brown buildings.
Light-Emitting Fabrics, Kent Williams, 59˝ × 82˝, 2008, Madison, Wisconsin
Light-Emitting Fabrics is a stellar example of the versatility and power of value in a design. Kent used high, medium, and low values in a variety of colors to create wonderfully lustrous columns. Each column enhances our interest, as it varies slightly from the others in color and value. The darkest hues appear as shadows, while the lightest ones appear to be emitted light.
Catena, Timna Tarr, 67˝ × 62˝, 2011, South Hadley, Massachusetts
Gathering a wide variety of fabrics in a full range of values, Timna created an innovative twenty-first-century design using a historical, traditional quilt block. Through careful fabric placement and good value change, she incorporated the illusions of luminosity, transparency, and depth into her design.
Natural Wonders, Kathy McNeil, 60˝ × 63˝, 2010, Tulalip, Washington
Natural Wonders is a breathtaking seascape that draws us into its captivating scene. The colors of the water are tantalizingly true. Looking through the stone waterway to the mountain beyond is so beautifully done with atmospheric perspective. The illusion of depth for everything else is created primarily through overlapping. The large stones create amazing depth through overlapping. Vegetation and objects nestled here and there look realistically placed. Kathy’s attention to nature’s use of color, value, and texture makes this scene stunningly realistic.
Mariner’s Compass, Linda Crouch-McCreadie, 68˝ × 68˝, 2012, Jonesborough, Tennessee
Mariner’s Compass pairs the high contrasts of black and white with light-, medium-, and dark-value colors to create a dramatic impact. The batik star points that extend past and into the concentric circles promote the illusion of depth as shapes overlap. Judy Niemeyer of Quiltworx designed this dynamic foundation-pieced pattern.
Teapot, Kate Themel, 17˝ × 36˝, 2008, Cheshire, Connecticut
Created in a primary triadic color plan, Teapot is filled with wonderful illusions. The teapot’s warm hues separate it from its multicolored background. The teapot’s highlights and shadows hint of light falling onto the scene. Even the steam appears real, as it mistily flows above the teapot.
INTRODUCTION
Color is magical. It offers the power to communicate visually. It can create a sense of drama or peacefulness. It can evoke feelings of happiness, excitement, fragility, calmness—almost anything. Knowing how color works gives you the ability to create beautiful, imaginative designs with the colors you love.
Color Play, Second Edition is filled with color information, ideas, and visual enticements to help you create the designs you envision. In addition, it includes clues on how to create nature’s most captivating color illusions, such as depth, luminosity, luster, transparency, highlights, shadows, and reflections. This book has been completely rewritten and reorganized to make it a workable, handy reference. Here is a list of the most important items you will find in this book:
CHAPTER ONE
Historical facts and essential need-to-know basic color information
CHAPTER TWO
The five most beautiful color plans and their important color partners
CHAPTER THREE
The inner workings of value and different value-play strategies
CHAPTER FOUR
The most important traits, characteristics, emotional reactions, and physical effects of each of the major color families
CHAPTER FIVE
A color reference for each of the 24 colors and their natural color partners
CHAPTER SIX
The how-to steps to create depth, luminosity, luster, transparency, highlights, shadows, reflections, and other important landscape illusions
Springtime in the Valley, Joen Wolfrom, 192˝ × 54˝, 1986, Fox Island, Washington
Dawn starts with the luminous glow from the sun before it peeks over the Cascade Mountains in Springtime in the Valley. The luminosity is created using clear, soft, buttery yellow hues that have been surrounded by toned apricots in the sky and powdered blue hues in the mountain range. Atmospheric perspective creates the illusion of depth.
Solving the Mysteries of Color
Living nearly three centuries apart, two geniuses made discoveries that give us a color foundation that affects every facet of color theory. First, Sir Isaac Newton discovered that he could curve the rainbow’s prismatic colors into a circle to make the colors flow from one to another unendingly. Then, Herbert Ives discovered that a small group of colors could be blended to create