Majarkeun: Looking at Work in Grayscale

Wednesday, February 22, 2017

Looking at Work in Grayscale

Lee Kaloidis, whom Ive referenced a few times in this blog, has created a Flickr album of his Whale Songs series, showing it in grayscale as well as in color. He says:

Im posting the Whale Songs in gray scale so that I have a record of them. But also because studying paintings in gray scale is fundamental to the way I work and why I do so much work in black and white, and anyone whos interested in my work should know that. Throughout every painting session Im studying gray scale photos of the piece as it develops. I know if a piece is articulate, balanced, well-constructed, legible, and engaging in gray scale it is fundamentally sound. Color is a strange thing and is a little like money in that it distorts clarity of vision and judgment, and so it is good, IMO, to be able to remove it from the equation in order to assess things at a distance that is free from the distortions of the sensational.

I would not say that a painting cant be successful if color if it is not successful in black and white, but it does seem like a good tool for looking at your work in progress. Seeing your work minus the strong language of color allows you to see things you wont see otherwise. This is similar to seeing your work from a distance, through a camera lens, or on a computer screen. It gives you a different view, which can be revealing.

I just did a few grayscale versions of some 8"x8" print/collages to see how they looked:

Available link for download