Teaching Color

One of my favorite classes in college was called “Color” and based on the work and ideas of Josef Albers. I wanted to use what I learned them, combined with what I’ve learned about color from marketing and psychology to teach a class exploring the abtract topic.

In July, I taught a course at The Brooklyn Brainery called Color! (is Awesome Even If You’re Not an Artist). The course explored color across a variety of topics—the science, psychology, history, and culture of color.

Here are some fun facts I learned:

A computer screen can make 17 million colors
Question: Are white and black colors? White is if you’re talking about additive (light) color, but isn’t if you’re talking about subtractive (pigment) color. The opposite is true for black.
The k in CMKY stands for key, or black.
Da Vinci thought the primary colors were white, yellow, green, blue, red, black, which psychologists later found were the colors primary to sensation.
Goya (and basically everyone else during his time) was driven into insanity by the paints they used- cadmium yellow, mercury red, white lead.
Birthstones go back to the bible! Exodus 28:17-20 and Revelation 21:19-20
The color of 2011 is honeysuckle (according to Pantone).
Have you ever noticed color clichés exist in marketing?