In the future, every color will be world-famous for 15 minutes

I couldn’t resist twisting Andy Warhol’s quote after seeing the first museum survey exhibition of the work he produced during his final years. It was worth taking the train to Fort Worth during my brief stay in Dallas to see "Andy Warhol: The Last Decade" at the Modern Art Museum.

If truth be told, I was more motivated to see the Ando-designed Museum – a cluster of floating pavilions - than the Warhol exhibit. The experience turned out to be a clash of the colorless world of Ando’s concrete and steel structures and the riotous colors of Warhol’s canvases and prints. A powerful juxtaposition of geniuses and color theory!

Prior to seeing this exhibit, I had always thought of Warhol (1928–1987) as an artist with a crayola coloring-book approach to color. Any color would work as long as it was a raw primary or secondary color. The image – Marilyn Monroe, Mao, or shoes – was the focus. In fact, we recognize his position in art history as the man who transformed soup cans and other icons of pop culture into true art.

Now we have this exhibit ... and it exposes his mastery of color and techniques on a scale that you have to see to believe. For example, “Christ 112 Times /Detail of The Last Supper” is an acrylic with silkscreen ink on canvas the size of a bus. 112 small panels of Jesus’ face (from “The Last Supper”) in yellow on black fill the painting. Yellow and black!

On a smaller scale, his series of “Shadows” panels (about 4’ x 6’ each) contain a single geometric colored shape that seems to glow from within. They actually rivaled the mystical quality of the Rothko painting in the permanent collection below the Warhol exhibit.

By the way, during the last decade of his life, Warhol created more artwork - and on a vastly larger scale - than during any other phase of his 40-year career. This exhibit was a rare opportunity to view 55 works that had never been seen together for the first time.

It seems that his color sensitivity was making history in a way that Andy may not have realized. But then again, maybe he did. As it turns out, he was a closet Catholic and - perhaps in the same sense that he was a master of puns - he loved to play with color as much as the object during his last years.

Video - Warhol Exhibit

Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth

Note: The exhibit travels to the Baltimore Museum of Art, October 17, 2010–January 9, 2011.

Working with Color: Bailouts and Branding

I love interviews with the press because there’s always one challenging question that requires a good answer. Last week, the interviewer asked, “How do you get your color consultation projects?” I replied that half the time, there’s a color disaster underway and someone contacts me. Typically, “the boss” has chosen his or her favorite color for the logo (or the product, packaging, etc.) and a member of the staff senses that there is something terribly wrong with the choice.

One of my recent projects is a perfect example of these color bailouts: In this case, the CEO had chosen purple for the bank’s new logo and all collateral material. The V-P questioned whether purple was appropriate and provided a list of the attributes that the logo color should communicate: simplicity, ease of access, multiple access points, state of the art technology, and ecological awareness. As for demographics, the customers ranged from GenY to Baby Boomers in the mid-west, (U.S.). Yes, she was right about her color intuition. Although purple does align itself with high technology, it would fail to address all the other critical criteria for a bank. My ten-page documentation presented an objective analysis of purple and a specification for the best color. (By the way, the nice part of this business is knowing that you can mediate a dispute with rational information – and you always gain some insights about the mysterious and compelling world of personal color preferences.)

Another situation unfolds when the color selection has been placed in the hands of the pigment or paint chemists and someone in another department raises a red flag. For example, it wasn’t very long ago that the colors for pills came out of the lab – and these colors typically had no logical connection to color communication and the consumer. Consider this: The "Golden Rule" in pharmaceuticals is to select colors that represent the cure, not the malady. Picture a grey anti-depressant tablet - and then think about what color should be avoided for a sleeping pill. (See Taking the Colors of Medications Seriously)

As for the rest of my color projects, I’m usually involved before a product is rolled out and long before there’s a problem. In recent years, golf carts, computer hardware, medications, garbage cans, and even toilet plungers have been part of the mix. However, just when it seemed that most of my focus was on branding and marketing, an architectural project arrived and I wound up analyzing paint scrapings under a microscope and specifying paint colors for a historical restoration.

The only thing that challenges me about this work is that I have to shut down my personal passions for colors and stick to objective criteria. I’ll admit that yellow has always been my favorite color and that other colors drift into my personal kaleidoscope – colors like tomato red and tender shades of teal. But this is my personal agenda and I’d never apply it to the real world of color consultation.

Here comes trouble: Paint matching apps for the iPhone

Its' supposed to solve the dilemma of winding up with all those cans of paint in colors that are too bold, too dingy, or not quite right. Both Benjamin Moore's Ben Color Capture and Sherwin-Williams' ColorSnap applications for the iPhone work the same way: Take a picture with your iPhone, zoom in on an area of color that you want to match in paint. Click “match” and the application gives you a range of paint options just like a real paint strip from their catalogue (either Moore or Sherwin). On the plus side, it shows the color’s nearest neighbors, in both lighter and darker shades.

However, you’re still in for hours of hard work. After you buy a quart of paint (or a gallon if the color is unavailable in quart sizes) you have to try it in the room. It’s best to test the color in several areas of the room - one area in bright light and one in the shade. Look at it at night and in the daytime as well. Chances are that the color isn’t what you expected. Paint chips are very tricky, regardless of whether you selected the color in the store or with this app. So, now it’s back to the paint store with the other color options generated by the iPhone app.

It does seem to solve one problem: Color samples in the paint stores are usually affected by store lighting and always look different when they’re on a wall in your home. On the other hand, the lighting issue on the iPhone is also problematic. Too little light, and your color image ends up dull, faded, or too dark; too much, and your colors end up washed out or too pale.

Will these apps save you hours and hours of agony? Not really. They have a long way to go before they can take a very clear color-accurate picture of whatever it is that inspires you - and adjust for all the variables between a photograph and a can of paint.

It will make it easier in one way: Beginning a task is usually the biggest challenge.

I’ll make it even easier by giving my blog fans a copy of “Color Tips” - a set of pages of tips for using colors schemes and layouts for your home (from my recent publication, Color Matters for the Home). For the next two weeks, you can download it for free. Click here.

A Color Heaven

Three weeks ago, I presented a seminar about color in Bermuda. I’ll admit that I’m quite spoiled by living in the color paradise of Hawaii. I’m not easily swept off my feet, but the colors of Bermuda - everything from sand to architecture - were stunning and classy, at that.

Real men wear pink - pink shirts and even pink shorts. In fact the logo on the airport terminal is a pair of pink Bermuda shorts. Aside from wearing apparel, many of the beaches are pink and so are the homes and many of the commercial buildings.

Buildings are also painted shades of blue that melt into the sky; others are lemony tints or startling salmon oranges. In fact, the buildings are every color of the spectrum - and every shade of pink.

I wonder why we tend to be so color-phobic about architecture in the U.S.? Even in tropical places like Hawaii, it’s mostly a sea of grey or beige pablum. Traditionally (and historically), the closer you get to the sea, the more colorful the buildings. It’s time for a change!