Why is Scottish Art so colourful?
There is a big drive on colour by contemporary Scottish artists. However, pushing the boundaries of palette combinations and vibrancy is not a new concept....
Scottish artists have been exploring the unlimited effects of driving colour to almost extremes throughout the twentieth and twentyfirst centuries.
George Birrell
The influence stemming from French avante-garde leaders including Van-Dogen and Matisse had an immediate and lasting legacy on the art of future influential Scottish artists John Ducan Fergusson, Francis Cadell and Samuel Peploe, cementing a legacy of colour exploration in generations of subsequent scottish artists.
Much of the work by contemporary Scottish artists vears away from the often dull and grey effects of the typical Scottish weather, embracing an enhanced version of reality with vibrancy and contrast.
Painters deal practically with pigments, so "blue" for a painter can be any of the blues: phthalocyanine blue, Prussian blue, indigo, Cobalt blue, ultramarine, and so on. One artist's subtle explication on a blue sky, could be another's brilliant, smack-you-right-between-the-eyes interpretation.
Colours only add to the potential, derived context of meanings, and because of this, the perception of a painting is highly subjective.
Of course the quality and vibrancy of modern artistic materials may well play a part in such a dramatic use of colour, with many contemporary artists combining different media to create bold compositions.
Maybe it is a colourful revolution, or perhaps has been intrisically ingrained in the teaching of Scottish art schools for years. Could it be that Scottish creatives are more inclined to use artistic licence when the landscape surrounding them is so often dull and grey?
Whatever the reason for this dramatic burst of colour throughout contemporary Scottish artwork, I for one am thrilled! The more colour the better.
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