Going Green

My hazel eyes exhibit a pronounced red-green color weakness, the one I read about in biology, the one I’ve never been tested for. I realized more about the weakness when I said something about a green car that I was told was bright red. I lived in a world of my own perception, a world not much different than anyone else’s I knew. But the non-issue eventually became more unsettling. I began to wonder if I’d start becoming confused about red and green traffic lights. I never have.

In graduate school, a musicology professor told me both his parents were professional artists. He assumed he’d follow suit but was not allowed to when he started painting skies green. Since his parents couldn’t imagine an artistic career without absolute color accuracy, he was sent away from the studio to the music practice room.

My green-red crisis increased when I began applying myself to art. It wasn’t much of a problem in my first collages that featured only basic colors, but when I changed to collages made with magazine pieces, I faced a dilemma. Would I ever be able to distinguish the multitude of green shades? Would I make a fool of myself and make skies green? I could imagine it. To me many greenish shades appear gray. I did my artwork but shied away from greens. On occasion their employment seemed unavoidable, so I would lay out the pieces I wanted to put together and leave them arranged on a table. Day after day I’d stop by to glance at them in order to see if they still went together. Finally I would glue them to the ground but always with a sense of insecurity.

I gave one-such collage to an artist friend of mine. I knew he’d like the subject and the way I worked it, but I was unsure he’d like the greens I put together. I must have said something about hoping my color blindness didn’t ruin the piece. He studied it and announced, “The artist who put these greens together isn’t color blind.” I wondered if he was right, if I could really become an artist.

I liked the affirmation and realized, given time, I could determine what greens go together. I was determined to do the work no matter that my fifth-grade teacher made fun of my drawing and no matter what red-green challenges my color blindness might create. People with all kinds of disabilities still live lives full of skills and activities they are naturally ill prepared for. I could overcome my weaknesses.

I recall one autumn afternoon when Myrna and I set out on a drive from Jefferson City, MO to Columbia. We crossed the river bridge and wended our way through the river bottom. As we crossed Clear Creek, Myrna said with wonder, “Look at that tree.”

I looked and saw a hillside of green. “Yes, it’s pretty,” I replied, “But what tree did you want me to see?”

“The brilliant red tree; the only one there.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t see it.” As I drove on up the hill towards our destination I realized I probably would have been able to see it had I stopped the car and stared at the hillside. I further realized I had color blindness, a kind of blindness that is common in boys and men. I also wondered how much this was due to always being contented just to distinguish reds, blues, and yellows, greens, oranges, and purples, whites, blacks, and browns. I did know turquoise as well, but I had none of the fancy terms for various shades and hues, not like my mom and sisters. I had never learned to distinguish them, or perhaps I couldn’t see them at all. I was easily stumped by apricot, peach, tangerine, and shrimp; plum, purple, grape, and violet; crimson, carmine, vermillion, and candy apple. Perhaps I needed language development as well as color sensitivity

Now—many collages and paintings later and eight years of working jigsaw puzzles with Ruth who works by color—I have improved immensely in my ability to distinguish colors. I still perversely mix strange greens with the knowledge that such shades mingle in nature, so why not on my canvas. I haven’t painted a green sky although I have occasionally seen skies with a greenish cast since I grew up in Kansas where tornadoes turn the sky, clouds, and landscape strange hues. I do my work and delight in unusual colors combinations. And I am joining a popular movement by going green with increasing usage. Yes, I recycle; I even make art with recycled scraps and the like. I am careful not to waste. And I paint with green pigments like they might go out of style before I master their shades, tints, and mixes. I still don’t really like to eat greens, at least not collard and mustard greens, but who knows; perhaps I will grow to like, distinguish, and appreciate them too.

Denver, 2011

Mixed media on watercolor paper. Phillip Hoyle