Color Afterimages

Color Afterimages

This series was influenced by my interest in color theory and the way colors interact optically. Inspired by artist Liz Nielsen’s darkroom-based chemigram work, I sought to recreate a similar effect using digital photography and layering techniques. The process began with cut-out sheets of colored paper, each photographed under different lighting conditions on a black reflective surface. The images were then layered digitally, using transparency and blending techniques to simulate additive color mixing.

What interested me most was how the interaction of these colors happened not through physical blending but through the layering of light itself. Instead of mixing pigments, the compositions rely on transparency and overlap to generate new hues, similar to the way projected light combines in RGB color theory. This process transforms the flatness of the original materials into dynamic compositions where color appears to radiate and shift.

Color Afterimages is an exploration of color, material, and light. How physical elements can be reinterpreted digitally, and how our perception of color is shaped by layering, transparency, and contrast.