The Color Red

I can hardly believe that Christmas is next week, marking the year end already. I've been busy this week, working out a problem with a portrait (more on this), so like most busy people, I've been venturing out to do last minute shopping. It's somewhat amusing to see people's faces turn red and flip the finger at each other or cut someone off in a huff on the road or become impatient in line inside the stores. What Christmas spirit! I'd like to see what those people do in a real crisis. Shopping should be fun not stressful, especially in a country where we have just about everything imaginable at our fingertips and on sale too! Sadly, for some people flaring tempers are not seasonal.

When I see people behaving like petulant children, it makes me think about what goes on inside a victim's home. The holiday excuses, the financial implications, and family gatherings become used as REAL threats, not just anonymous annoyances left at the mall. This is one aspect of domestic violence I never thought about. This page on Linda King's website, http://www.fixthehurt.com/holidays.html, explains it clear and simple.

The aforementioned portrait problem has to do with color and some advice based on trial and a really big error. I am working a pastel on bright poppy red paper. This person has fair skin and and unfortunately has a lot of cool tones, even in warm light. It took me a couple of days to figure out the flesh tone on red paper. I was able to figure out a semblance of flesh looking color by covering the red with a cool green and mixing a cool brown into it, then layering the warmer colors. Amazingly it worked, otherwise ALL my colors were coming out like light bulbs. My suggestion is not to use bright red as a ground for a portrait pastel. I found myself turning red with frustration as I repeatedly started over. Now with that said, I am very glad I did it because it was an excellent learning experience in flesh tone mixes and paper color backgrounds. The silver lining cliche really is true, so let's all have a calm and wonderful holiday and leave the color red to lights, bows, stockings and Santa's cheeks and nose this Christmas.

~HAVE A
MERRY CHRISTMAS ~