Color is one of the most simple but complicated areas in the art world.  It can change the whole mood of an art work, create depth and perspective, elicit emotions and the list goes on.   Color a circle of color (say red) on a page and surround it with another color.  Then take that same circle of red color and surround it with a totally different color, the red will look like a different red color even though it is not.

Artists through time have used color to create their styles, for example Kandinsky focused on blue for a time.  His titles reflect that (“The Blue Rider”, “Blue Horse I”, “Large Blue Horses”).  Cezanne said “Blue gives other colors their vibration.”   He used orange shades in his still life and landscapes with shades of blue for contrast.   If you really want to explore color and its attributes, its history and where colors come from read “Bright Earth” by Philip Ball.  It is packed full of 340 pages of color information!