April Monthly Challenge Color Palette

As an art major in college, I was required to take three art history survey classes: ancient art to the Renaissance, the Renaissance to modern, and modern art. I, being a little contrary, did them backwards. So, the first art history I ever studied was the Impressionist movement, and it left a big impression (pun totally intended) on me.

I love the Impressionists. I love that they were challenging the idea of what art should be, I love the paint strokes, I love the subject matter. Degas has such a haunting quality to work, and everything he did feels quiet and contemplative to me. And through a crazy random happenstance, because I didn’t pick the artwork this month, Swaying Dancer (Dancer in Green) is one of my favorite pieces from Degas.

There are so many colors in this piece, but we can separate them down to four: beige, orange, blue, and blue-green. There are touches of other colors in there, too, like green, but those four are the ones used most or are the first seen (like orange).

If you plan to follow the painting faithfully, aim for grayer beiges, both light and dark. You can see these primarily in the floor and the skin tones. For the oranges, focus on the dresses of the background dancers; use light peach and a darker red-orange hue. These are definitely on the red-orange side of things, so aim for those shades instead of a true orange or a yellow-orange. For the blues, stick with the darker shades. There are touches of light blue in the skirts, but the majority of blues are saturated shades ranging from mid to dark blue. And finally, the blue-greens. These are in the mid to light value range, and on the softer, grayer side, so start there.

Your turn: what colors are you loving this month?