1 00:00:08,580 --> 00:00:09,580 In the previous lesson, 2 00:00:09,740 --> 00:00:11,540 I told you about some of my inspirations. 3 00:00:12,200 --> 00:00:17,100 In this lesson, I'll go more in-depth into the teachings of Joseph Albers and Johannes Eden, 4 00:00:17,460 --> 00:00:21,060 two of the most important instructors in the history of art and design education. 5 00:00:22,240 --> 00:00:25,620 Joseph Albers was a student and an instructor at the Bauhaus. 6 00:00:26,440 --> 00:00:27,760 In the mid-1930s, 7 00:00:27,860 --> 00:00:28,540 he and his wife, 8 00:00:28,640 --> 00:00:31,460 Annie Albers, emigrated to the United States and they taught 9 00:00:31,460 --> 00:00:32,680 at Black Mountain College, 10 00:00:32,840 --> 00:00:35,440 an experimental art school in North Carolina. 11 00:00:36,300 --> 00:00:37,440 After Black Mountain College, 12 00:00:37,620 --> 00:00:39,040 Albers taught at Yale School of Art, 13 00:00:39,180 --> 00:00:42,580 where he developed many of the assignments that are featured in Interaction of Color. 14 00:00:43,300 --> 00:00:44,300 In addition to teaching, 15 00:00:44,520 --> 00:00:45,440 Albers was a painter, 16 00:00:45,820 --> 00:00:48,400 a poet, a photographer, and a graphic designer. 17 00:00:48,620 --> 00:00:51,500 This is one of his album covers back here that he did in the early 60s. 18 00:00:51,500 --> 00:00:54,260 As an artist, Albers is best known as a painter, 19 00:00:54,480 --> 00:00:56,860 and in particular, his Homage to the Square series. 20 00:00:57,240 --> 00:01:00,420 His Homage to the Square paintings are beautifully documented in this book, 21 00:01:00,920 --> 00:01:02,720 Formulation and Articulation. 22 00:01:05,000 --> 00:01:14,600 These are two beautiful examples of his Homage to the Square paintings reproduced in this 23 00:01:14,600 --> 00:01:18,580 book, and they both show what he was interested in, 24 00:01:18,660 --> 00:01:19,820 which is color interaction. 25 00:01:20,200 --> 00:01:22,260 And as you look at these paintings, 26 00:01:22,620 --> 00:01:30,700 you can begin to see a little bit of this idea of colors that seem to emerge and colors that seem to recede into the two-dimensional picture plane. 27 00:01:31,820 --> 00:01:33,820 And as we go through the book, 28 00:01:33,900 --> 00:01:36,140 we'll see other examples of his work, 29 00:01:36,260 --> 00:01:37,600 not just Homage to the Square, 30 00:01:37,800 --> 00:01:39,480 but other things that he was interested in, 31 00:01:39,900 --> 00:01:42,800 like these beautiful paintings here of these folded shapes. 32 00:01:43,600 --> 00:01:47,240 Albers was very interested in space illusion, 33 00:01:47,580 --> 00:01:49,780 and so most of his work has that aspect to it. 34 00:01:51,440 --> 00:01:55,700 These drawings in particular really get that sensation of space illusion. 35 00:01:56,580 --> 00:01:58,240 It's hard to tell what parts are receding, 36 00:01:58,460 --> 00:01:59,420 which parts are advancing. 37 00:02:02,580 --> 00:02:08,760 In this piece, you can really see the influence of the Bauhaus. 38 00:02:09,280 --> 00:02:09,780 The negative space is really articulated. 39 00:02:11,320 --> 00:02:15,840 In fact, the negative space here is the dominant part of the composition, the focal point. 40 00:02:18,680 --> 00:02:21,260 More beautiful Homage to the Square paintings. 41 00:02:22,220 --> 00:02:26,260 You might notice that the palette is the same on both of these paintings. 42 00:02:26,780 --> 00:02:29,220 The same colors are used in both paintings, 43 00:02:29,400 --> 00:02:31,300 but they're used in different ways, 44 00:02:31,740 --> 00:02:32,760 and so the colors seem to emerge and recede in different amounts. 45 00:02:33,720 --> 00:02:41,360 This motif goes all the way back to the Bauhaus. 46 00:02:42,620 --> 00:02:44,520 Albers was initially a glass artist, 47 00:02:45,440 --> 00:02:47,420 and a lot of his work was produced in glass, 48 00:02:47,540 --> 00:02:49,020 including some of these compositions. 49 00:02:49,620 --> 00:02:51,660 Here, they're just reproduced as line compositions. 50 00:02:52,940 --> 00:03:02,640 This piece in particular goes all the way back to the Bauhaus, 51 00:03:03,040 --> 00:03:07,860 and a version of this is actually reproduced as a mural 52 00:03:07,860 --> 00:03:10,820 in what used to be the Pan Am building in New York City. 53 00:03:11,000 --> 00:03:12,120 Now it's the MetLife building. 54 00:03:12,780 --> 00:03:14,720 So if you're walking through Grand Central Station, 55 00:03:14,960 --> 00:03:17,200 you can take a little detour and see a mural 56 00:03:17,340 --> 00:03:18,800 based on this design concept. 57 00:03:19,120 --> 00:03:23,500 Here you can see Albers working with grayscale, 58 00:03:24,060 --> 00:03:27,940 but still intent on producing that sensation of colors 59 00:03:27,940 --> 00:03:30,000 that seem to advance and colors that recede, 60 00:03:30,660 --> 00:03:32,300 and this whole idea of space illusion, 61 00:03:33,160 --> 00:03:36,020 which parts of the composition seem to be coming toward us 62 00:03:36,020 --> 00:03:37,240 and which parts are going away. 63 00:03:39,240 --> 00:03:45,420 These paintings, 64 00:03:45,800 --> 00:03:47,520 which are not Homage to the Square paintings, 65 00:03:47,520 --> 00:03:49,100 are something a little bit different, 66 00:03:49,840 --> 00:03:52,340 almost like a stereoscopic effect, 67 00:03:52,600 --> 00:03:55,040 and sometimes they produce what are called afroimages, 68 00:03:55,880 --> 00:03:58,500 illusions of rectangles that seem to bounce 69 00:03:58,500 --> 00:03:59,480 around the picture plane. 70 00:04:00,660 --> 00:04:14,360 Here you see the same composition produced first as line 71 00:04:14,680 --> 00:04:16,540 and then with form, 72 00:04:17,360 --> 00:04:18,740 and notice how the form, 73 00:04:19,100 --> 00:04:21,860 some of the forms are articulated with very crisp edges, 74 00:04:22,620 --> 00:04:25,720 and some edges are very rough, very complex. 75 00:04:27,180 --> 00:04:31,320 Again that same composition reproduced here in color. 76 00:04:35,120 --> 00:04:39,320 More variations of Homage to the Square. 77 00:04:39,800 --> 00:04:51,000 So here again we have these compositions that are really stereoscopic and producing afroimages. 78 00:04:51,560 --> 00:04:52,860 I can start to see them a little bit. 79 00:04:52,980 --> 00:04:55,060 This happens quite a bit when you're working with 80 00:04:55,280 --> 00:04:58,200 complementary colors, colors that are opposite each other on the color wheel, 81 00:04:58,380 --> 00:04:59,260 like orange and blue. 82 00:05:01,400 --> 00:05:08,340 And finally, the last thing I'll show you in this book is this beautiful series of red 83 00:05:08,640 --> 00:05:09,340 compositions, 84 00:05:09,660 --> 00:05:10,900 all Homage to the Squares. 85 00:05:12,000 --> 00:05:17,560 One of the things that Albers talks about in his teaching is the idea that we all have a different idea of what red is, 86 00:05:17,880 --> 00:05:19,760 and oftentimes he would experiment with this, 87 00:05:19,800 --> 00:05:23,800 asking his students to bring samples of whatever they think of as red. 88 00:05:25,060 --> 00:05:27,400 And here we see all these different reds, 89 00:05:27,940 --> 00:05:28,740 bright reds, 90 00:05:29,100 --> 00:05:33,160 dark reds, light reds, vivid reds, dull reds. 91 00:05:33,680 --> 00:05:38,320 Albers was very interested in this idea of how we identify color and how we relate to it. 92 00:05:38,560 --> 00:05:43,400 He would talk about the concept of actual color and factual color. 93 00:05:44,340 --> 00:05:45,720 Actual color being what we see, 94 00:05:46,240 --> 00:05:50,840 and factual color being what we recognize as the scientific name of a color. 95 00:05:51,020 --> 00:06:02,700 The book that Joseph Albers is most famous for is Interaction of Color, 96 00:06:02,960 --> 00:06:08,560 a collection of his color experiments that he perfected while he was teaching at Yale. 97 00:06:09,960 --> 00:06:11,380 When we open the book, 98 00:06:11,460 --> 00:06:13,900 we immediately see these beautiful color experiments. 99 00:06:14,360 --> 00:06:20,020 They're all meant to produce the effect of colors looking as if they're different on different grounds. 100 00:06:21,180 --> 00:06:27,240 This book has these little dots down in the corner that Albers has put there 101 00:06:27,240 --> 00:06:29,380 to tell us how to look at the work. 102 00:06:31,000 --> 00:06:37,800 When we look at this first composition, 103 00:06:38,400 --> 00:06:39,780 and when I showed this to students, 104 00:06:39,860 --> 00:06:41,240 I always asked them the same question, 105 00:06:41,420 --> 00:06:42,660 how many colors do you see? 106 00:06:43,500 --> 00:06:46,940 Most people are going to say three because they know the experiment. 107 00:06:47,860 --> 00:06:48,720 But when we really 108 00:06:48,720 --> 00:06:51,280 look at this, we actually see four different colors. 109 00:06:51,960 --> 00:06:52,920 One, two, 110 00:06:53,400 --> 00:06:54,260 three, and four. 111 00:06:55,080 --> 00:06:57,060 These two colors are actually the same, 112 00:06:57,340 --> 00:07:00,160 but they appear different on different kinds of grounds. 113 00:07:00,900 --> 00:07:02,560 The purple on this side is dark, 114 00:07:02,900 --> 00:07:04,420 the green on this side is light. 115 00:07:05,060 --> 00:07:06,100 So each of those colors 116 00:07:06,100 --> 00:07:08,420 has a different effect on the inside color. 117 00:07:09,800 --> 00:07:11,920 Albers calls this the relativity of color, 118 00:07:12,180 --> 00:07:14,220 and he says that in art and design, 119 00:07:14,640 --> 00:07:16,220 color is the most relative medium. 120 00:07:16,880 --> 00:07:17,920 It's always changing. 121 00:07:17,920 --> 00:07:19,200 It's always deceiving us. 122 00:07:20,060 --> 00:07:21,120 In this experiment, 123 00:07:22,500 --> 00:07:25,040 Albers says, make five colors look like six. 124 00:07:25,960 --> 00:07:29,040 And all of his color experiments really have that idea in mind, 125 00:07:29,080 --> 00:07:31,500 trying to create an illusion of some kind. 126 00:07:32,120 --> 00:07:34,160 So when we look at this grouping of colors, 127 00:07:34,480 --> 00:07:38,260 we see one, two, three, four, five, six colors. 128 00:07:39,140 --> 00:07:41,980 Here we have fairly vivid orange, 129 00:07:42,200 --> 00:07:43,140 a very vivid yellow, 130 00:07:43,540 --> 00:07:46,920 a dark blue, and a very vivid, 131 00:07:47,140 --> 00:07:48,560 very intense kind of blue-green, 132 00:07:48,720 --> 00:07:49,680 almost a cyan color. 133 00:07:50,660 --> 00:07:52,540 And then these two small squares here, 134 00:07:53,160 --> 00:07:55,800 one is kind of a dull orange, 135 00:07:56,080 --> 00:07:57,440 not as vivid as this orange. 136 00:07:57,840 --> 00:07:59,000 And then on the other side, 137 00:07:59,140 --> 00:08:01,300 we have a square that's very dull and dark. 138 00:08:02,520 --> 00:08:05,640 And actually looking a little bit blue too, a little bit. 139 00:08:06,400 --> 00:08:07,880 And when we lift up this flap, 140 00:08:08,240 --> 00:08:09,840 we see that it's actually the same color. 141 00:08:10,580 --> 00:08:12,520 So five colors, 142 00:08:12,920 --> 00:08:15,420 one, two, three, or five, 143 00:08:16,260 --> 00:08:17,120 can look like six. 144 00:08:17,280 --> 00:08:20,840 One, two, three, four, five, six, based on the grounds. 145 00:08:22,660 --> 00:08:26,440 Another great example from this book, 146 00:08:26,700 --> 00:08:30,880 which shows a window with two gray 147 00:08:30,960 --> 00:08:33,340 squares, rectangles on the inside. 148 00:08:33,440 --> 00:08:34,260 They appear the same. 149 00:08:34,960 --> 00:08:36,880 And when we pick up the window, 150 00:08:37,020 --> 00:08:41,380 we see that those two gray squares are on different grounds. 151 00:08:41,540 --> 00:08:42,900 Again, a light and a dark ground. 152 00:08:43,880 --> 00:08:47,640 We see that this square rectangle looks light, 153 00:08:47,900 --> 00:08:48,780 and this one looks dark. 154 00:08:50,860 --> 00:08:53,060 Now we can start to think about what's actually going on. 155 00:08:53,360 --> 00:08:55,580 Now we can see what's really going on. 156 00:08:55,700 --> 00:09:01,380 The background color is affecting the inside color by subtracting its essential qualities. 157 00:09:02,400 --> 00:09:06,460 In this case, the light green is subtracting its lightness from the rectangle, 158 00:09:06,640 --> 00:09:07,540 making it look darker. 159 00:09:08,740 --> 00:09:09,360 In this case, 160 00:09:09,760 --> 00:09:12,120 the dark color is subtracting its darkness, 161 00:09:12,840 --> 00:09:14,820 making the rectangle look lighter. 162 00:09:15,980 --> 00:09:17,840 In fact, they're the same physical color, 163 00:09:19,140 --> 00:09:20,220 but we see them differently. 164 00:09:22,040 --> 00:09:25,940 So Albers says, this is what we call factual color, 165 00:09:27,460 --> 00:09:29,360 and this is what we call actual color. 166 00:09:30,140 --> 00:09:31,180 It's actually what we see. 167 00:09:31,980 --> 00:09:37,200 Again, 168 00:09:37,580 --> 00:09:40,280 same color on different grounds, 169 00:09:40,500 --> 00:09:42,620 producing very different color effects. 170 00:09:44,980 --> 00:09:49,840 Here we see the same green grid pattern 171 00:09:50,060 --> 00:09:51,400 used on two different grounds. 172 00:09:51,840 --> 00:09:54,800 On one side, the green looks light. 173 00:09:54,980 --> 00:09:55,680 On the other side, 174 00:09:55,720 --> 00:09:56,480 it looks dark. 175 00:09:56,720 --> 00:09:58,460 And on one side, 176 00:09:58,540 --> 00:09:59,900 it looks more of a yellow green. 177 00:10:00,900 --> 00:10:01,740 On the other side, 178 00:10:01,780 --> 00:10:02,540 more of a blue green. 179 00:10:03,860 --> 00:10:05,520 So this is color relativity. 180 00:10:06,780 --> 00:10:09,800 Color is always relative to its background. 181 00:10:10,200 --> 00:10:10,860 It shifts. 182 00:10:12,180 --> 00:10:15,840 If you were to do a Google search for Albers' color illusion, 183 00:10:16,460 --> 00:10:17,860 you'd probably see this image. 184 00:10:17,960 --> 00:10:19,120 It's one of his most famous. 185 00:10:20,540 --> 00:10:25,720 The two color rectangles are very different in hue, 186 00:10:25,960 --> 00:10:27,760 meaning one is pink and one is green. 187 00:10:28,580 --> 00:10:30,200 They're actually complementary colors, 188 00:10:30,340 --> 00:10:32,340 colors that are opposite each other on the color wheel. 189 00:10:33,360 --> 00:10:36,980 And then there's an X on the inside of each of these colors. 190 00:10:37,760 --> 00:10:39,900 And that X is actually connected at the bottom, 191 00:10:40,840 --> 00:10:44,320 meaning that this X and this X are actually the same color, 192 00:10:44,940 --> 00:10:46,100 actually, meaning what we see. 193 00:10:46,460 --> 00:10:50,940 But when we look at this X, it looks darker, 194 00:10:51,320 --> 00:10:52,540 and this one looks lighter. 195 00:10:53,620 --> 00:10:58,780 And in fact, if you stare right in the center of this composition for, say, five seconds, 196 00:10:59,640 --> 00:11:02,120 this X starts to look pink, 197 00:11:02,500 --> 00:11:03,640 like this color. 198 00:11:04,220 --> 00:11:06,740 This X starts to look green, like this color. 199 00:11:08,460 --> 00:11:10,480 Now that has to do with color relativity. 200 00:11:10,480 --> 00:11:15,440 The background is affecting the way we perceive these Xs. 201 00:11:17,060 --> 00:11:20,760 And going back to that other concept of subtraction, 202 00:11:20,880 --> 00:11:25,440 the background is subtracting its essential qualities from that X 203 00:11:25,440 --> 00:11:27,380 to produce that color illusion. 204 00:11:28,160 --> 00:11:29,140 So in this case, 205 00:11:29,420 --> 00:11:30,900 the green subtracts its darkness, 206 00:11:31,340 --> 00:11:32,500 makes the X look lighter. 207 00:11:33,820 --> 00:11:36,680 In this case, the pink subtracts its lightness, 208 00:11:37,100 --> 00:11:38,460 makes the X look darker. 209 00:11:38,960 --> 00:11:43,140 And the green is subtracting its greenness, 210 00:11:43,500 --> 00:11:46,520 making the X look more pink or red. 211 00:11:47,460 --> 00:11:48,160 Here, 212 00:11:48,540 --> 00:11:51,380 the pink or red is subtracting its redness, 213 00:11:52,080 --> 00:11:53,740 making the X look more green. 214 00:11:55,280 --> 00:11:57,620 Jumping ahead in interaction of color, 215 00:11:57,760 --> 00:12:01,440 we get to another essential color experiment that Albers taught his students. 216 00:12:01,680 --> 00:12:05,260 He calls this the illusion of transparency. 217 00:12:06,020 --> 00:12:08,940 And sometimes he calls it transparence and space illusion. 218 00:12:09,940 --> 00:12:11,040 And this is a great example. 219 00:12:12,040 --> 00:12:14,220 These are three colors that are meant to create 220 00:12:14,220 --> 00:12:15,600 the illusion of transparency. 221 00:12:15,980 --> 00:12:17,640 There's no actual transparency here. 222 00:12:18,220 --> 00:12:20,100 We have a dark gray or a black, 223 00:12:20,620 --> 00:12:21,500 a medium gray, 224 00:12:21,920 --> 00:12:23,320 and this lighter gray over here. 225 00:12:24,200 --> 00:12:29,080 And it appears that this rectangle of gray 226 00:12:29,080 --> 00:12:30,940 is overlapping this darker rectangle in the middle. 227 00:12:30,940 --> 00:12:34,340 And it's overlapping this darker rectangle and producing this color, this middle color. 228 00:12:34,700 --> 00:12:35,200 But in fact, 229 00:12:35,800 --> 00:12:38,900 it's three different colors meant to suggest an illusion. 230 00:12:39,480 --> 00:12:44,640 This is another way for Albers to teach us about how color is relative. 231 00:12:45,680 --> 00:12:49,820 And how we basically will try to see things that we want to see, 232 00:12:50,180 --> 00:12:51,100 which is transparency. 233 00:12:51,340 --> 00:12:54,200 We're used to seeing transparent materials create this effect. 234 00:12:54,700 --> 00:12:56,340 But in reality, 235 00:12:56,740 --> 00:12:58,780 what we're really seeing here is just an illusion, 236 00:12:59,120 --> 00:13:00,360 an illusion of transparency. 237 00:13:01,620 --> 00:13:04,860 Here's another good example of the illusion of transparency. 238 00:13:05,540 --> 00:13:06,120 And in this case, 239 00:13:06,200 --> 00:13:10,720 the background color is also having an effect on how we perceive this illusion. 240 00:13:12,340 --> 00:13:19,060 So one, two, three, four different colors producing the sensation of colors seemingly 241 00:13:19,060 --> 00:13:22,280 to be transparent as if they're transparent film. 242 00:13:22,280 --> 00:13:27,580 Now, some of you will see this rectangle overlapping this rectangle. 243 00:13:28,320 --> 00:13:33,320 Some of you might see this rectangle overlapping this rectangle as if they're transparent. 244 00:13:37,660 --> 00:13:46,820 The last illusion of transparency example I'll show you out of this book is this, 245 00:13:46,920 --> 00:13:47,940 what we call the ladder. 246 00:13:48,180 --> 00:13:52,040 It's like a ladder that you would climb up with rungs. 247 00:13:52,920 --> 00:13:54,700 It's really interesting to look at this. 248 00:13:55,180 --> 00:13:56,400 For the background color, 249 00:13:56,940 --> 00:13:59,140 the gray is very consistent all the way around. 250 00:14:00,160 --> 00:14:04,980 The yellow is consistent all the way through here. 251 00:14:05,820 --> 00:14:10,060 And then these squares of red that are on the outside of the yellow band 252 00:14:10,060 --> 00:14:11,460 are all the same color. 253 00:14:11,680 --> 00:14:16,160 The only thing that changes are the inside colors here. 254 00:14:17,440 --> 00:14:19,600 And they get progressively lighter, 255 00:14:20,440 --> 00:14:23,160 mixed with the yellow to produce that sensation 256 00:14:23,160 --> 00:14:24,720 that they're actually receding, 257 00:14:25,580 --> 00:14:26,980 going back in space. 258 00:14:27,140 --> 00:14:28,500 So on a two-dimensional surface, 259 00:14:29,100 --> 00:14:33,280 we now see that transparency and effect space illusion.