First A Little About You

Before I get into telling you about myself, let me say something about you.

My guess is you are a passionate and creative spirit simply because you are reading this page. You absolutely love to express yourself with color and paint. When you paint with color, you totally go into another zone that makes your heart soar.

Plus you love to learn new techniques to make your artwork stand out.

But maybe .......

You sometimes end up with muddy colors in your artwork and don't know why.

You want to feel more confident and spontaneous with your colors when you paint.
You want to create sophisticated, yummy Color Schemes that don't clash.

You're overwhelmed or confused by so many color choices and have no clue where to begin narrowing down

You wish there was a simple, fool-proof step-by-step method of making your colors
sing your song.

Person painting blue color tests for about page

No matter where you are in your creative journey, you want your artwork to have a BIGGER impact.

I Know All About Those Feelings

Color is my passion too. I've personally experienced every one of the same challenges. And I totally understand how creating Color Schemes that both surprise and harmonize can be super frustrating for artists at all levels. Keep reading further down about my own journey with color and how I came to build this site.

Color is magical. It has the power to soothe, energize and can even have a healing effect. Being surrounded by colors we love in our lives makes us happier.

As a creative spirit, easily making your colors sing in harmony will make you even happier

What I Believe About Creativity

I believe creativity has the power to transform lives in a more meaningful way.
I believe anyone can be more creative if they want to.

I believe talent is a myth. Talent is simply the result of consistently applying what we know while exploring what
we don't know.
I believe there is no such thing as perfection, especially when it comes to creativity.

I believe we keep improving our creative skills by making lots of mistakes and learning from them.
I believe we cannot learn to be more creative just by reading. We need to practice by doing until it gets easier.

I believe, to be at your most creative, first you need to understand Color Theory and Principals and Techniques. After that, you know how to bend the rules to truly stand out.

I believe you can easily become a Color Expert by allowing me the pleasure of being your color mentor.

What Others Say About Color Wheel Artist

I've enjoyed your website sooo much, thanks for sharing. I think it's actually helping me understand why every color I choose just doesn't seem to ring. :(( I don't think interior design comes natural to me, but I do love colors.

I have not had an artist's brush in my hand either, but your website gives me a sense of motivation down the line to give it a try!

Debra M.
Michigan, USA

I just want to say how I appreciate the fact I found this website. I happen to have a color deficiency, (color blindness) which has always caused me to be discouraged in my artistic talent.
For many years I gave up my desires of painting . In the past I painted animals, staying with browns. I recently remember painting in mono tone in my art class in junior high(many years ago) and have never thought of it since until just today as a matter of fact. I was surprised when I googled mono color painting and found this website.
I am excited to start my venture... long waiting. Thank you!

Clarissa K.
England

Thank you so much for all this brilliant information !! And for taking the time to share so much information, that is really FABULOUS, and WHAT a beautiful website !!! I just bought 2 Color Wheels....but didn't need to, your site has all the information there is... and more
THANK YOU SOOOOOO MUCH !

Pebbles M.
California, USA

I just wanted to say how much I Love your site. It is so informative. I am heavily influenced by colour - it really affects my mood so it's great to have hues, tints, shades explained so simply for the layman!

Susan T.
Australia

Thank you so much Shirley for the wealth of info on color! Through it I feel I better understand, especially the tetrads.

Now I need to apply it to my work. Appreciate your courage!

Raquel B.
Texas, USA

A Little About Me

I'm Shirley Williams and I've been a professional artist for over 25 years.

Artist Shirley Williams in studio painting

Color is my passion!

Way back in the early 90's, when I began my full-time career as a professional artist, the internet did not exist the way it does today. In those days there were few opportunities to learn and grow as an artist other than traditional art-schools and workshops. When it came to learning about Color, even art schools didn't teach much. That's because back then, Conceptual Art was in favor, which was all about thinking rather than painting. Believe it or not, painting something beautiful was looked down upon by the art world at that time.

Although Conceptual Art was interesting, it left me a bit cold and hungry for connection. It didn't fit my desire to paint artwork that moves people emotionally. Therefore I decided not to finish my art degree. Instead, I spent countless hours in the library, reading every art book I could find. And of course, I spent countless, daily hours in the studio, continuously pushing myself to improve.

My Art Heroes were, and still are, the ColorField Painters of the 1950's and 1960's. A few of my favorites include Mark Rothko, Morris Louis, Helen Frankenthaler and Clyfford Still. Today, no one does it better than Gerhard Richter, who's taken the emotional quality of Color to a new level of virtuosity. These artists' paintings stop people in their tracks, not because of an image, but simply to soak up the color vibrations on the canvas. They inspired me to study color and its power to stir something within us.

My entire creative life has been devoted to exploring organic color in my paintings. As a result of so many years in the studio, I've accumulated stacks of information about color. I have cupboards full of Inspiring Photos, Notebooks and Sketchbooks, not to mention thousands of photos of my paintings, sold long ago.
Check out my paintings at ShirleyWilliamsArt.com

Why I Built This Site About Color

One day, while putting some old color tests in a storage box, I realized it might be fun to share my color experience with other artists. That's because, what often comes up in conversations with creative people, is their challenges with color. So I thought, 'Maybe I can shed some light on that subject to ease the frustration so many creative people feel.'

After all, I can truly relate to being challenged by color. It's such a huge topic and there are billions of choices. Where do you begin? How do you pick colors that look good together? It seems overwhelming at first.

Early on, when it came to creating the colors on the canvas that I saw in my mind, the results were hit and miss. I found it super challenging to mix and harmonize my paint palettes while painting spontaneously. Believe me, I made tons of muddy mistakes. Gradually, through trial and error, I developed simple, fool-proof approaches to selecting and mixing pigments.

So in 2008, I built ColorWheelArtist to share all this good stuff online. To my complete amazement, the response and growth of the site over the years has been phenomenal. This is the third makeover for ColorWheelArtist as it continues to get better at connecting and inspiring Color Lovers all over the world. It makes me so happy to see more and more creative people just like you jumping on board.

Welcome to a colorful new world !!