The Cold Blue of Winter

If you're familiar with the concept of temperature as it pertains to color, then you know that yellows and some reds are considered "warm" and blues, violets and some greens are considered "cool." When I think of the way the world looks during most of the year, the general temperature is warm. Spring is all yellows and yellow-greens, giving way to darker but still warm greens as summer comes in. Summer is a mix of greens--mostly warm but there is a mix of blue-greens (shadows, evergreens) that an artist would call "cool". Fall is a riot of warms--reds, yellows, oranges--fading into duller, browner hues. 

Winter, on the other hand, is almost all blues, violets, blue-greys and so on. Winter is a cold, blue season. 

"Raccoon River, Winter," ink and wc on paper, about 3.5x10

The watercolor above is a reasonably true representation of how winter looks these days.