Colour is the element of art that is produced when light striking an object or a subject is reflected back to the eye. In art colour has a plethora of attributes and meanings which are subjective by social, political, historical and personal beliefs and/or culture.

Colour Theory is a number of specifications on how colour is used by artists and designers; they underpin how a creative person makes noted decisions on how to work with it in relationship to the other elements of art and principles of design.

Hue a colour or a shade

Primary colour red, blue and yellow

Secondary a colour that has been made by mixing any two of the primary colours

Tertiary colour a colour that has been made by adding equal amounts of a primary and secondary colour

A twelve section colour wheel

Element of Art – “colour” subject vocabulary

Hue	A true colour, without tint or shade. This is generally what we mean when we say ‘colour’.
Chromaticity	The “colourfulness” of a hue. Chroma, the Greek word for colour – purity.
Satuation	The intensity (strength) of a colour.
Value	The brighter the colour the higher the value/
	Colour Mixing & Using the Colour Wheel
Primary colours	red, yellow and blue
Secondary colours	green, orange and violet (purple)
Tertiary colours	red-orange, red-violet, yellow-orange, yellow-green, blue-violet, blue-green
Monochromatic	a colour scheme just using one colour (several shades of the same colour)
Analogues	any three colours side-by-side on the colour wheel eg. orange, red-orange and red
Complementary	two colours that are opposite eg. red and green
Triadic	three colours on the colour wheel that are equal distance from each other
Neutral	colours that are NOT found on the colour wheel eg. grey, brown
Warm Colours	colours that do not include blue
Cool colours	colours that do not include red
Tints	white added to a colour
Shades	black added to a colour
Tones	grey added to a colour