Learn Colour Basics
Welcome to the Colour Literacy Project’s Colour Basics pages. These pages are structured around the four Colour Literacy Cornerstones:
EXPERIENCING
COLOURS
Colour plays a fundamental role in our lives, and helps us understand the world around us.
Colour connects us to our surroundings, our histories, and our cultures.
Let us open our eyes to the wonder and beauty of colours in the world!
PERCEIVING COLOURS
The colours we see depend on interconnections between light, objects, observers, and their contexts.
Our exercises integrate perception-based colour learning with a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Design, and Math) framework.
DESCRIBING COLOURS
Colours come in so many variations - there is much more to colour than red, blue, green and yellow!
Colours can be pale, dark, muted or vivid. By expanding our colour vocabulary to include the three dimensions of colour, we are more attentive to the world around us.
Learn basic colour specification systems.
WORKING WITH COLOURS
Start with hands-on colour experiments and explorations: experience before explanations.
Take a multi-disciplinary approach and build bridges between the sciences, arts, design, and humanities.
Develop problem-solving and investigative know-how.
Use colour as an effective communication tool.
Fundamentals and Misconceptions
One of the main goals of our project is to re-frame colour education to start with seeing, noticing and describing all the variations of colours we can see. Too often studying about colour begins with mixing red and yellow and blue- coloured paints (or maybe cyan, magenta and yellow paints instead), and learning the names of colours in the rainbow. Instead, we would like you to have a look around your surroundings, and really notice the colours you see. Once you are able to see and notice and describe colours, with all their beautiful variations, you will have a well-established base from which to continue your colour journey.
Our Colour Fundamentals pages introduce key ideas about the important role of colour in our lives and how we see colours. Our Misconceptions pages cover common misconceptions about colour.
Our pages include several straightforward exercises for you to do, which will help deepen your experience with colour. Beginning colour studies with the way we experience colour in our daily lives is another important goal of our project.
These pages are a work in progress, and more topics/pages will be posted soon. If you have any comments about this Colour Basics section, please reach out to us using the CONTACT link at the bottom of each page.
To find our more about the Colour Literacy Project’s philosophy and approach, please read our tenets.
